6 ms·

It’s pretty depressing that two of the higher profile SV scams in recent years involved woman founder/CEOs

api 8y ago
Dont worry. There are plenty of scammy vaporware startups founded by men. Just look at pretty much the whole cryptocurrency field for starters.
- wpietri 8y ago
  Agreed. I have now been asking this question for nearly a decade: what economic value does cryptocurrency deliver today? So far, I have found no good answer to that. (Note that speculation does not create value; it at best transfers it from bet-winners to bet-losers. Crime seems to be the next-most-popular use case, and that is also generally net negative economically. And not also that the future isn't today. Which seems obvious, but every time I ask this I get a lot of fantasies about the future.) That hasn't stopped an awful lot of people from raising money and launching ICOs for products that haven't worked and often couldn't possibly work. For example, see David Gerard's excellent ongoing dissection of Kodakcoin: https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/tag/kodakcoin/ https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/tag/kodakcoin/
legostormtroopr 8y ago
No, its pretty predictable and preventable. People clamor over themselves to prove how "woke" they are when a woman CEO comes along and prove how totally not sexist they are. When Theranos was first starting there was lots of solid critiques of why it was all a scam, and so much of that was deflected as "sexism" [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Theranos was bound to fail, and was bound to implode - not just because Holmes was a fraud, but because the wokeness of Silicon Valley was complicit in her fraud, but letting her deflect any and all criticism as sexism. Criticising a fraud who happens to be a woman isn't sexist and we shouldn't let people get away with suggesting otherwise. Thats the only way to prevent this exact same scenario from happening again. [1] https://www.bustle.com/articles/117841-is-criticism-of-billionaire-elizabeth-holmes-sexist-yes-no https://www.bustle.com/articles/117841-is-criticism-of-billi... [2] http://fortune.com/2015/12/10/elizabeth-holmes-sexism-theranos/ http://fortune.com/2015/12/10/elizabeth-holmes-sexism-theran... [3] https://medium.com/@abyah.wynn/elizabeth-holmes-and-the-struggle-of-being-a-female-entrepreneur-5a34bd154d57 https://medium.com/@abyah.wynn/elizabeth-holmes-and-the-stru... [4] https://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/15/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holmes-is-a-victim-venture-capitalist-tim-draper-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/15/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holme... [5] https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/08/03/488569884/is-there-a-double-standard-when-women-ceos-in-tech-stumble https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/08/03/48... [6] https://www.google.com.au/search?q=theranos+sexism https://www.google.com.au/search?q=theranos+sexism
- api 8y ago
  Was "wokeness" a factor in Juicero? Clinkle? There are dozens of these. The common denominator is charisma and hubris on the part of the founder(s). Lots of investors go for that. I'd put the blame on the cult of the charismatic leader in business.
  - DuskStar 8y ago
    Theranos seems to have lasted quite a bit longer than Juicero, and I'm not aware of any criminal charges for Juciero's founders. (Never heard of Clinkle) So perhaps comparing the two isn't entirely fair. Also, Juicero failed because of poor product/market fit and excessive price. Theranos had fantastic product market fit, it's just their product didn't function properly and relied on lying to their investors, their customers and the FDA.
  - L_226 8y ago
    Juicero wasn't a fraud, just a really bad idea.
    - api 8y ago
      UBeam is a really bad idea too. It "works" under controlled conditions, but it's horribly inefficient and would not be practical under regular conditions. It's more like Juicero than Theranos.
  - legostormtroopr 8y ago
    Juicero was an overpriced juicer. The people who bought it still got the machine and the juice - albeit DRM juice that could be squeezed by hand. There is zero fraud, just an overhyped product. Theranos made fraudulent claims about their product, pressured themselves into the health care market, and violated hundreds of ethical guidelines. Not only were investors defrauded (oh well, its only money) - people used them in clinical scenarios and impacted actual healthcare patients. When people questioned these claims, the CEO publicly claimed criticism of her was sexist, and the media was complicit. These two scenarios are vastly different.
paul7986 8y ago
You want to be successful and quickly so? Throw out your morales and do whatever it takes (cheat, lie, steal, etc) to smash all others big and small. Business can be and or is flat out ruthless!
userbinator 8y ago
It is, and I suspect the whole "let's help make her successful because she's a woman, that's a good rolemodel for STEM, etc." contributed to this mess. As it turns out, in the real world your gender does not change your abilities to break the laws of physics.
tdb7893 8y ago
Honesty there are tons of dumb SV scams but people tend to focus on the founders more if they are a woman in my experience.

api 8y ago

Dont worry. There are plenty of scammy vaporware startups founded by men. Just look at pretty much the whole cryptocurrency field for starters.

wpietri 8y ago
Agreed. I have now been asking this question for nearly a decade: what economic value does cryptocurrency deliver today? So far, I have found no good answer to that. (Note that speculation does not create value; it at best transfers it from bet-winners to bet-losers. Crime seems to be the next-most-popular use case, and that is also generally net negative economically. And not also that the future isn't today. Which seems obvious, but every time I ask this I get a lot of fantasies about the future.) That hasn't stopped an awful lot of people from raising money and launching ICOs for products that haven't worked and often couldn't possibly work. For example, see David Gerard's excellent ongoing dissection of Kodakcoin: https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/tag/kodakcoin/ https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/tag/kodakcoin/

legostormtroopr 8y ago

No, its pretty predictable and preventable. People clamor over themselves to prove how "woke" they are when a woman CEO comes along and prove how totally not sexist they are. When Theranos was first starting there was lots of solid critiques of why it was all a scam, and so much of that was deflected as "sexism" [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Theranos was bound to fail, and was bound to implode - not just because Holmes was a fraud, but because the wokeness of Silicon Valley was complicit in her fraud, but letting her deflect any and all criticism as sexism. Criticising a fraud who happens to be a woman isn't sexist and we shouldn't let people get away with suggesting otherwise. Thats the only way to prevent this exact same scenario from happening again. [1] https://www.bustle.com/articles/117841-is-criticism-of-billionaire-elizabeth-holmes-sexist-yes-no https://www.bustle.com/articles/117841-is-criticism-of-billi... [2] http://fortune.com/2015/12/10/elizabeth-holmes-sexism-theranos/ http://fortune.com/2015/12/10/elizabeth-holmes-sexism-theran... [3] https://medium.com/@abyah.wynn/elizabeth-holmes-and-the-struggle-of-being-a-female-entrepreneur-5a34bd154d57 https://medium.com/@abyah.wynn/elizabeth-holmes-and-the-stru... [4] https://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/15/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holmes-is-a-victim-venture-capitalist-tim-draper-says.html https://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/15/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holme... [5] https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/08/03/488569884/is-there-a-double-standard-when-women-ceos-in-tech-stumble https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/08/03/48... [6] https://www.google.com.au/search?q=theranos+sexism https://www.google.com.au/search?q=theranos+sexism

api 8y ago
Was "wokeness" a factor in Juicero? Clinkle? There are dozens of these. The common denominator is charisma and hubris on the part of the founder(s). Lots of investors go for that. I'd put the blame on the cult of the charismatic leader in business.
- DuskStar 8y ago
  Theranos seems to have lasted quite a bit longer than Juicero, and I'm not aware of any criminal charges for Juciero's founders. (Never heard of Clinkle) So perhaps comparing the two isn't entirely fair. Also, Juicero failed because of poor product/market fit and excessive price. Theranos had fantastic product market fit, it's just their product didn't function properly and relied on lying to their investors, their customers and the FDA.
- L_226 8y ago
  Juicero wasn't a fraud, just a really bad idea.
  - api 8y ago
    UBeam is a really bad idea too. It "works" under controlled conditions, but it's horribly inefficient and would not be practical under regular conditions. It's more like Juicero than Theranos.
- legostormtroopr 8y ago
  Juicero was an overpriced juicer. The people who bought it still got the machine and the juice - albeit DRM juice that could be squeezed by hand. There is zero fraud, just an overhyped product. Theranos made fraudulent claims about their product, pressured themselves into the health care market, and violated hundreds of ethical guidelines. Not only were investors defrauded (oh well, its only money) - people used them in clinical scenarios and impacted actual healthcare patients. When people questioned these claims, the CEO publicly claimed criticism of her was sexist, and the media was complicit. These two scenarios are vastly different.

paul7986 8y ago

You want to be successful and quickly so? Throw out your morales and do whatever it takes (cheat, lie, steal, etc) to smash all others big and small. Business can be and or is flat out ruthless!

userbinator 8y ago

It is, and I suspect the whole "let's help make her successful because she's a woman, that's a good rolemodel for STEM, etc." contributed to this mess. As it turns out, in the real world your gender does not change your abilities to break the laws of physics.

tdb7893 8y ago

Honesty there are tons of dumb SV scams but people tend to focus on the founders more if they are a woman in my experience.