6 ms·
Agreed. Fuck Benchmark. Travis makes each partner $1 billion personally and this is how they treat him? They should be blackballed by every great founder out th
by thebmax 9y ago
Agreed. Fuck Benchmark. Travis makes each partner $1 billion personally and this is how they treat him? They should be blackballed by every great founder out there. I had respect for benchmark but not anymore. They are greedy assholes.
- chinathrow 9y ago> Travis makes each partner a $1 billion personally On paper.
- jethro_tell 9y agoYeah, not if the company gets banned from self driving car tech for 10 years or something. This will likely have an impact on the value of uber on paper or other.
- arikr 9y ago*Before carry
- bearcobra 9y agoA question I've been pondering since the Martin Shkreli verdict, is fraud OK if the deceived parties still profit?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- danielam 9y agoA consequentialist might argue that it is, but then, consequentialists are wrong.
- EthanHeilman 9y agoGiven human nature, widespread belief in consequentialism as an ethical system would likely result is very bad consequences. So from the position that consequentialism is correct it is probably unethical to advocate as a correct viewpoint.
- shallot_router 9y agoWhat if (purely hypothically) all consequentialists could agree on the same set of standards for what constitutes positive and negative utility?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- EthanHeilman 9y agoHow do you think this purely hypothetical conspiracy of consequentialists would go about convincing people to follow that set of standards? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie#Plato.27s_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie#Plato.27s_Republic
- sah2ed 9y agoFraud is never OK. The end does not justify the means.
- angersock 9y agoWhat a small-minded view. Our entire runs on fraud of one degree or another--sometimes it's just more than people are willing to bear.
- sah2ed 9y agoYou are joking right? The question about fraud was in the context of the misappropriation of capital from investors for a purpose different from what was initially agreed to, and not as a general catch-all term for posturing or affectation either by politicians or the general populace.
- angersock 9y agoHell, you could make the same argument about a company jumping into a different product line with capital intended for a particular buildout. Your blanket statement "this is never is justified" was my primary objection.
- shallot_router 9y agoYes. You can't take a bunch of money from investors and then lie to them and tell them their money's doing great when most of it's actually gone, even if you do later manage to hit it big and pay them back. Imagine the kind of precedent that would set if this weren't considered fraud. "Temporary Ponzi schemes" would spring up everywhere. Maybe it changes the charges and the sentencing, if there is no indication that the person sought to personally profit or steal from the investors, but lying is lying.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- SomeStupidPoint 9y agoIt seems like newspeak to call people "greedy" for suing someone despite that they (nominally) made a lot of money for those people. It seems like the fund is insisting that its investments follow the law, not indemnify criminal actions, etc. Doing that to an investment that made you money seems the opposite of greedy. How are we seeing this so differently?
- abiox 9y ago> It seems like the fund is insisting that its investments follow the law the fund is not the police or courts, though... right? it's not their "job" to ensure the law is asserted upon the land - at least not beyond their own avoidance of wrongdoing. > not indemnify criminal actions IANAL, but the state is the plaintiff in criminal cases. this case just seems to be benchmark asking that newly added board seats be removed.
- SomeStupidPoint 9y ago> at least not beyond their own avoidance of wrongdoing Such as enforcing that people contracted to carry out work on their behalf do so in a manner that conforms to their ethical stands? A fund policing the habits of an investment is literally the people who own the business policing the actions of their employees -- I think most of us agree that a business has the right to enforce ethical standards on employees. > not the police or courts Both of these institutions are primarily complaint driven -- the fund filed a complaint that people they employed violated the rules of their employment and is asking the courts to make it right. (Slight more convoluted, but that's the gist of it.) > state is the plaintiff in criminal cases That has nothing to do with indemnifying someone from the financial consequences of their actions -- a third party can offer to pay your penalties. > seems to be benchmark asking that newly added board seats be removed Are there no prior cases where board actions to create board seats were reverse because of fraud? I'm skeptical. But more to the point -- so what? We have well established law that you can revisit agreements made on a fraudulent basis and they're asking the courts to mediate just such a dispute. I'm actually unsure how you think any of this should work based on your objections, aside from that corporate managers shouldn't be liable, even to the corporate owners, for their actions.
- sb8244 9y agoDoes money absolve a founder from potentially fraudulent behavior?
- adventured 9y agoOnly if you're willing to give a pass on that type of behavior based on generated returns. Wall Street has certainly historically been filled to the brim with that approach. The problem, typical even on Wall St., is that fraudulent behavior tends to be derived from the person's character, not a one-off. The odds are very high - in my opinion - that it would happen again. The Wall St. types that cross the line to generate returns, seem to frequently also light the house on fire given enough time.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- sctb 9y agoWe detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14983424 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14983424 and marked it off-topic.