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I've had a bad feeling about Dave McClure and 500 Startups since their Geeks on a Plane trip to India. I was living in India at the time with a few other Ameri

I've had a bad feeling about Dave McClure and 500 Startups since their Geeks on a Plane trip to India. I was living in India at the time with a few other American open-source engineers. I reached out to 500 Startups and GOAP several times about the trip and couldn't even get a response. The whole premise of GOAP felt like a way for Dave McClure to travel to remote places with attractive women. I'll probably get heavily down-voted for this comment, but I think it's not very far away from the truth.

hkmurakami 9y ago
I always felt that something's amiss when you name your Korea fund "500 Kimchi" and let that hit media headlines. I mean wouldn't people in South Korea find this to be derogatory?
- Scoundreller 9y ago
  Good question: would they? If you named your Canadian fund “500 Maples”, nobody would have a problem. “500 Poutines” just wouldn’t get taken seriously.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - hateduser2 9y ago
    I think when you swap south korea for canada, which is pretty culturally identical to america, you lose all the history of racism against eastern people and countries. So I wouldn't blame them if they did, and I would kind of expect them to actually, and would consider alternate views exceptions or even misguided. Its not necessarilly bad but it looks pretty bad.
    - GordonS 9y ago
      It works both ways though - there is plenty racism from many in the east against western people both black and white. As a (very!) white person I've experienced this first hand in several places in Asia.
- gcatalfamo 9y ago
  Can’t seem to find a translation: what does kimchi mean in Korean? Edit: never mind. Found it. Haha.
  - AznHisoka 9y ago
    I thought it mean "love" for some reason... maybe I'm thinking of a different Korean word.
    - gcatalfamo 9y ago
      It’s a local dish/recipe...not very startup-py I’d say...
      - dsnuh 9y ago
        I believe it is fermented cabbage.
        kristianc 9y ago
        So more startuppy than it might first appear then
  - sincerely 9y ago
    For anybody else curious, it's a fermented cabbage side dish, really delicious in my opinion :)
  - dboreham 9y ago
    Hmm...either I haven't found it or...it means "Kimchi" but you didn't originally know what Kimchi was (seems unlikely..)
- eric-hu 9y ago
  I'm in Thailand and there's a fund here called 500 tuktuks. The local startup people I talked to didn't find it offensive.
gruez 9y ago
>The whole premise of GOAP felt like a way for Dave McClure to travel to remote places with attractive women. why would he need an excuse? or did he want to travel on investor's dime?
- rhizome 9y ago
  You don't get rich by writing a lot of checks.
  - puhnbbuy777 9y ago
    Yeah lots of folks I've worked with, C*-level on down, plan vacations such that work pays for it (around conf travel dates, for example). Ain't gonna lie, I've done it; got to spend two days sightseeing Munich by straight up lying about how long it would take to fix the customers problem. I don't regret it. The extent of graft and grift on display by society as a whole... I don't feel like a villain for costing the customer a couple thousand dollars extra.
  - lkrubner 9y ago
    I don't understand why puhnbbuy777's comment has been killed. It looks like they created a throwaway account so they could admit to unethical behavior. Their comment seems like a useful perspective for us to keep in mind.
    - dang 9y ago
      I feel like we've had this conversation before? HN has software that kills some comments based on patterns of past abuses by trolls. Sometimes there are false positives. That unfortunately was the case here. Instead of posting an off-topic comment about it, why not just solve the problem by vouching for the original comment? That's why we added that feature: to rescue good comments that happen to be [dead]. All: to vouch for a dead comment, click on its timestamp to go it its link, then click 'vouch' at the top. There's a small karma threshold (currently 30) before such links appear.
waleedka 9y ago
This is a general comment not specific to the topic at hand. If you have facts to share then do so. But if you 'feel' that someone has an ulterior motive and you share it in a public forum then many people might take it as fact or an anecdote. Some people might even repeat it to their own friends. By doing so you risk harming the reputation of someone who may be innocent of that accusation. Let me demonstrate with an example: I 'feel' that you wanted to join GOAP because you wanted to hang out with attractive women. And I 'feel' that 500 Startups didn't respond to you because they recognized your sleazy intentions. And I feel that you got upset and this is your way of getting revenge. Now, obviously, I don't really feel that way. But I just wanted to show how easy it is to throw dirt at someone. Let's stick to the facts, please. disclaimer: I was in 500 Startups first batch.
- hitekker 9y ago
  I would recommend adding a disclaimer to your comment, that 500Startups is one of the two principal investors in the startup you own and manage. Otherwise, some may be inclined to question your motives. Edit: The requested disclaimer has been added.
  - waleedka 9y ago
    Thanks! Done. Although I hope I was clear that my comment is general and not specific to the topic at hand. I just think people should share the facts but be careful about making assumptions.
    - hitekker 9y ago
      Sure. The facts are that David Mcclure is stepping down due to his long-term sexual harassement of women: https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/01/500-startups-dave-mcclure-apologizes-for-multiple-advances-toward-women-and-being-a-creep/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/01/500-startups-dave-mcclure-... And is shutting down investment funds associated with him: https://betakit.com/500-canada-to-shut-down-fund-investments-following-dave-mcclure-scandal/ https://betakit.com/500-canada-to-shut-down-fund-investments... Considering the article above says 500 startups is refusing to pay its bills, one person sharing an anecdote of 500Startups being flakey and perhaps being oriented towards David's libido, doesn't seem alarmist or unreasonable at all.

hkmurakami 9y ago

I always felt that something's amiss when you name your Korea fund "500 Kimchi" and let that hit media headlines. I mean wouldn't people in South Korea find this to be derogatory?

Scoundreller 9y ago
Good question: would they? If you named your Canadian fund “500 Maples”, nobody would have a problem. “500 Poutines” just wouldn’t get taken seriously.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- hateduser2 9y ago
  I think when you swap south korea for canada, which is pretty culturally identical to america, you lose all the history of racism against eastern people and countries. So I wouldn't blame them if they did, and I would kind of expect them to actually, and would consider alternate views exceptions or even misguided. Its not necessarilly bad but it looks pretty bad.
  - GordonS 9y ago
    It works both ways though - there is plenty racism from many in the east against western people both black and white. As a (very!) white person I've experienced this first hand in several places in Asia.
gcatalfamo 9y ago
Can’t seem to find a translation: what does kimchi mean in Korean? Edit: never mind. Found it. Haha.
- AznHisoka 9y ago
  I thought it mean "love" for some reason... maybe I'm thinking of a different Korean word.
  - gcatalfamo 9y ago
    It’s a local dish/recipe...not very startup-py I’d say...
    - dsnuh 9y ago
      I believe it is fermented cabbage.
      - kristianc 9y ago
        So more startuppy than it might first appear then
- sincerely 9y ago
  For anybody else curious, it's a fermented cabbage side dish, really delicious in my opinion :)
- dboreham 9y ago
  Hmm...either I haven't found it or...it means "Kimchi" but you didn't originally know what Kimchi was (seems unlikely..)
eric-hu 9y ago
I'm in Thailand and there's a fund here called 500 tuktuks. The local startup people I talked to didn't find it offensive.

gruez 9y ago

>The whole premise of GOAP felt like a way for Dave McClure to travel to remote places with attractive women. why would he need an excuse? or did he want to travel on investor's dime?

rhizome 9y ago
You don't get rich by writing a lot of checks.
- puhnbbuy777 9y ago
  Yeah lots of folks I've worked with, C*-level on down, plan vacations such that work pays for it (around conf travel dates, for example). Ain't gonna lie, I've done it; got to spend two days sightseeing Munich by straight up lying about how long it would take to fix the customers problem. I don't regret it. The extent of graft and grift on display by society as a whole... I don't feel like a villain for costing the customer a couple thousand dollars extra.
- lkrubner 9y ago
  I don't understand why puhnbbuy777's comment has been killed. It looks like they created a throwaway account so they could admit to unethical behavior. Their comment seems like a useful perspective for us to keep in mind.
  - dang 9y ago
    I feel like we've had this conversation before? HN has software that kills some comments based on patterns of past abuses by trolls. Sometimes there are false positives. That unfortunately was the case here. Instead of posting an off-topic comment about it, why not just solve the problem by vouching for the original comment? That's why we added that feature: to rescue good comments that happen to be [dead]. All: to vouch for a dead comment, click on its timestamp to go it its link, then click 'vouch' at the top. There's a small karma threshold (currently 30) before such links appear.

waleedka 9y ago

This is a general comment not specific to the topic at hand. If you have facts to share then do so. But if you 'feel' that someone has an ulterior motive and you share it in a public forum then many people might take it as fact or an anecdote. Some people might even repeat it to their own friends. By doing so you risk harming the reputation of someone who may be innocent of that accusation. Let me demonstrate with an example: I 'feel' that you wanted to join GOAP because you wanted to hang out with attractive women. And I 'feel' that 500 Startups didn't respond to you because they recognized your sleazy intentions. And I feel that you got upset and this is your way of getting revenge. Now, obviously, I don't really feel that way. But I just wanted to show how easy it is to throw dirt at someone. Let's stick to the facts, please. disclaimer: I was in 500 Startups first batch.

hitekker 9y ago
I would recommend adding a disclaimer to your comment, that 500Startups is one of the two principal investors in the startup you own and manage. Otherwise, some may be inclined to question your motives. Edit: The requested disclaimer has been added.
- waleedka 9y ago
  Thanks! Done. Although I hope I was clear that my comment is general and not specific to the topic at hand. I just think people should share the facts but be careful about making assumptions.
  - hitekker 9y ago
    Sure. The facts are that David Mcclure is stepping down due to his long-term sexual harassement of women: https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/01/500-startups-dave-mcclure-apologizes-for-multiple-advances-toward-women-and-being-a-creep/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/01/500-startups-dave-mcclure-... And is shutting down investment funds associated with him: https://betakit.com/500-canada-to-shut-down-fund-investments-following-dave-mcclure-scandal/ https://betakit.com/500-canada-to-shut-down-fund-investments... Considering the article above says 500 startups is refusing to pay its bills, one person sharing an anecdote of 500Startups being flakey and perhaps being oriented towards David's libido, doesn't seem alarmist or unreasonable at all.