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If I read another piece of American corporate crap --- plastic, formulaic, always-be-selling --- I'm gonna throw up on my keyboard. The write-up is rife with st
by scrubs 5y ago
If I read another piece of American corporate crap --- plastic, formulaic, always-be-selling --- I'm gonna throw up on my keyboard. The write-up is rife with stock phrases, and vapid emotionalism. Somewhere when the rest of us are busy there's a room somewhere where people get the cheat-sheet, fill-in-the-blank training that produces this junk. Look the guy probably had some success and met some great people. So why in the hell can't you say that in your own words?
- throwaway84636 5y agoHe probably can but doesn't want to. He may be posturing for whatever thing he wants to do next which requires being "very professional" (aka high-quality executive bullshit). Or he might just be boring as hell. My dad was an executive, and he was one of the most bland and uncreative human beings I've ever met.
- dang 5y agoCould you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=community%20identity%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
- throwaway84636 5y agoIt turns out that using throwaway accounts completely changes the votes I receive for comments. It seems to result in way more positive feedback than sockpuppets. The last two throwaways I've used accrued several hundred points in less than a month just from comments (no submissions), whereas my 'normal' account actually gets so many negative and neutral votes that the score doesn't change, and seeing that literally makes me feel bad/sad/angry. It seems like throwaways could indeed create a different kind of forum - one where we get more positive feedback and don't feel bad. Or as another way to put it, a community can be toxic because people think they know who someone is.
- throwaway984393 5y agoI don't see the reply I made here with that throwaway (shadowban?), so I'm doing it with my other one. > for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to Apparently not! Using throwaways, people have upvoted me like crazy. Hundreds of points per month, for a person with no identity. If it kept going at the same pace, I would outrank some of the highest-point users within a year or two, all from using throwaway. Is that not community? And if it's not - isn't it better than community? Isn't upvoting someone you don't know, don't owe anything to, who you hold no preconceived ideas about, actually a more honest way to interact with a community? When I get upvoted, I'm happy. Me being happy encourages me to post in a happy mood, so I create happier comments (on average). When I get downvoted or ignored (on my 'real' account), I get angry and depressed, and that makes for much less happy comments (and just a bad feeling all around). Using the throwaways not only makes me less angry and depressed, but it also enables creating content that people clearly approve of. > Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community There have been throwaways on this site for ages, in addition to known people. The community hasn't disappeared as far as I can tell. So it seems like you can, in fact, have it both ways. In addition, I've been a member of a lot of different communities. A lot of the time, the ones that banter on about how much of a close-knit community they are, enable some of the most toxic behavior. There are some great aspects to community, and some horrifying ones. Rather than trying to change the community to fit the standards we think it should have, perhaps we should encourage the behavior that metrics show have a more positive outcome. I could be crazy, but it seems like anything that inspires more upvotes (without the content being hateful, vitriolic, judgemental or divisive) seems like it's worth keeping. Maybe I missed something, and there's some metrics-driven approach where you're pushing back on all throwaway behavior because its existence (regardless of content) leads to worse outcomes. Or maybe you just consider 'most' throwaways to post divisive content, and push back on all of them. Or maybe you just don't like the idea of throwaways, I dunno. All I know is this little experiment with throwaways has made me much happier on HN.
- dang 5y agoYou can't judge these things by upvotes alone. Indignation and flamebait routinely get upvoted, for example, and are obviously not what this site is for. The system is complex and upvotes are just one factor. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22upvotes%20alone%22%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... As for 'the community not disappearing' - this is a freerider argument. You're benefitting from the contributions of all the people who aren't behaving this way.
- ferdowsi 5y agoWhen you are a company leader, your words can have a material effect on your business. This is doubly so true at a disruptive point like leadership exits. Of course words are going to be delicately chosen? That being said I didn't notice anything particularly offensive about this letter. He describes the accomplishments under his watch, expresses gratitude for employees, and expresses confidence in his successor.
- systemvoltage 5y agoThere is one particular corporate leader who speaks their mind and has made a tremendous impact on the world. So, it's not clear if it has anything to do with polished big-corp language. I'd rather listen to someone who is straightforward than Sundar Pichai speaking entirely in corporate-speak while saying absolutely nothing of value or substance. Completely uninspiring. All corporate speak is rather an invention of the 80's and 90's. Listen to corporate leaders from any other time before that.
- ghostly_s 5y agoWho is that?
- __s 5y agoMusk
- kreeben 5y agoIt's funny to me that you think Musk isn't an "always-be-selling" type of person and that you think he speaks his mind without spewing "corporate speak" because to me, "Musk speak" is just another form of corporate speak. Musk isn't so much "speaking the truth", he's more "selling things, his way".
- __s 5y agoThat's cool; I was just answering ghostly_'s question as to whom systemvoltage was implying
- JohnWhigham 5y agoCorporate PR speak is a reflection of the American public's willingness to have corporations put their foot on their neck, and then play for the pleasure of it.
- vorpalhex 5y agoIncendiary statements don't add much to the conversation. You probably like buying groceries, you're typing on a computer and you presumably at least own clothes so you don't have a problem with all corporations. One would also assume you don't want a return to feudal society in which the goods generally available to you were those produced in a 2-mile radius.
- JohnWhigham 5y agoHere come the "yet you participate in society...curious!" posters. Also, nice strawman
- spicybright 5y agoThe computer point is fair, but for many growing your own food and making your own clothes is nearly impossible with some kind of corporation involvement.
- TheJoYo 5y agoYou might be reading the anti-corporate sentiment into that comment. It seems more directed towards the public space of Twitter and Facebook where corporations have enough rope to hang themselves in the town square.
- wongarsu 5y agoCorporate PR speak is a reflection of the American media's willingness to endlessly mock anything that is outside the accepted norm. PR speak is meaningless because saying something interesting isn't worth the potential blowback.
- VRay 5y ago
- bpodgursky 5y agoThen don't read it. I'm more tired of the whining.
- zarathustreal 5y agoThen don’t read it.
- bastardoperator 5y agoI don't think they did...
- OneTimePetes 5y agoCould have a warning label in the title similar to spoilers though - [PRSPAM]
- justin_oaks 5y agoNot OP, but it's hard to unread things.
- Taywee 5y agoFewer people probably would have read it if the title said what it actually was.
- tacon 5y ago>I will become Chairman Emeritus, which fulfills my lifelong ambition of having a title in Latin. "plastic, formulaic, always-be-selling" Huh?
- jb1991 5y ago"..which fulfills my lifelong ambition of..." OP is probably referring to this tired, cliched turn of phrase (among other examples in the blog).
- madeofpalk 5y agoI read this as a tongue in cheek joke?
- abzug 5y agoI read as dumb. It doesn't give any value to the piece, very akin to virtue signaling.
- meowface 5y agoI don't really think it's virtue signaling. "Virtue signaling" is itself an extremely tired cliche/accusation. To me it feels more like stock "relatability signaling", which gives me a similarly unctuous feeling. Kind of the nerd-corporatespeak version of "hello, fellow kids".
- jb1991 5y agoThat’s right, it is tongue-in-cheek, and a stereotypical way of doing so.
- junon 5y agoA lighthearted phrase, at worst. Are we not allowed to express ourselves except for the dryest, most information-dense prose?
- b3morales 5y ago
- Kiro 5y agoObnoxious comment and perfect example of how toxic this place has become.
- fishtacos 5y agoI actually thought OP's take was very pertinent to the situation. ...which was riddled with phrases like: "With all that we’ve accomplished in mind, and more than five great years at Microsoft under my belt, I’ve decided it’s time for me to go back to my startup roots. What drives me is enabling builders to create the future. Not even Clark Kent could be this braggadocios.
- _vertigo 5y agoSorry, what’s bad about that?
- afarrell 5y agoIf you start from the assumption that it is meaningless and insincere, then it is eye-rollingly vapid. If you start from the assumption that it is a genuine attempt to put messy feelings into concise words, then it is a bit lacks vividness but is nonetheless heartfelt. When you choose not to trust someone, you make them untrustworthy.
- fishtacos 5y agoIs that why we make judgement calls on this case? No one can know the intent or original thoughts of the author, but we can certainly ascribe qualities to their product based on our experience... The fun exercise here is not that this is yet another vapid post on HN, but that people are defending it.
- adventured 5y ago> The fun exercise here is not that this is yet another vapid post on HN, but that people are defending it. It's quite plausible that the simple truth of the matter is that some people commenting here, defending the post, may feel that HN shouldn't be so very frequently cynical, negative, mean, quick to jump to assuming the worst about intentions, and so on. The Guidelines - for good reason - even go out of the way to try to drive users away from behaving that way.
- macNchz 5y agoI'm with you about corporate drivel generally, but I'm not really seeing it here... this post is much more human and expresses seemingly genuine gratitude towards team members in a way that's absent from the utter tripe I find, for example, in the LinkedIn feed.
- htrp 5y agoI always wonder how much of these statements are PR driven vs PR edited... what percentage of these words actually belong to Nat vs the corporate communications team.
- xxs 5y agoSometimes I truly wonder if people can actually =talk= like that for reals. The 'blog' is practically unreadable mess, esp. given its name 'blog'.
- alexashka 5y agoHear, hear. As I live longer, I realize some people take to corporate speak and corporate values like ducks to water. It's actually their preferred mode of communication and existence. Politicians play this game most clearly - they need to communicate allegiance to the rich, their political party and 'the people', which is an impossible ask (because the parties are not aligned and you please one by taking away from the other) but they do quite well by having invented a vocabulary that's interpreted differently by each group, plus they can outright lie, which's a last resort move they try to avoid. Anyhoo :)
- hawski 5y agoIf we only could have honest tribal liars as Zoons have.
- friedman23 5y agoIf I was a ceo and I had an assistant, I would definitely tell them to write all the bs company letters for me...
- soheil 5y agoBecause this is a corporation. Why would he say it in his own words? This is not a dinner party with aunt and grandma, it's a multi-billion dollar business with lots of liability.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- junon 5y agoNat is a mogul in SV. Everyone knows him, many even before GitHub. Simply walking away from GitHub without much of a speech would make it seem like he didn't care or left on bad terms, optics-wise. That would have a potentially serious effect on perception and thus shareholders would be affected. This clearly isn't his intent. I offer a contrary point of view: why does it bother you so much? Simply do not read it.
- lexapro 5y ago>thus shareholders would be affected Why not just tell it like it is then? Dear shareholders, I'm leaving because I'm rich / bored with Github and not because there was a falling-out. >why does it bother you so much? Simply do not read it. So you're suggesting people should just not read or listen to anything that they don't like? And just keep quiet?
- junon 5y ago> Why not just tell it like it is then? Because what you suggested is extremely impersonal, arrogant, harsh, cold, and dismissive of the work of all the employees working under you.
- kodah 5y agoA little off-topic, but why does the CEO even need to say goodbye? I'm not really concerned with listening the words of most CEOs of companies I work at. It's just another job at the company, albeit, probably one with a bit too much power and influence.
- oaiey 5y agoBecause most likely he is already somewhere and this other company is not ready yet to share the change of CEO. This case has more than 50% likelihood.
- tgv 5y ago> shareholders It belongs to Microsoft, doesn't it?
- kodah 5y agoI feel you. Words of those in leadership positions can often seem fairly hollow. They don't just seem so, though, they are and that's on purpose. Being authentic as a leader is impossible. Your thoughts, desires, core beliefs, etc are going to be offensive to someone -- even if those disagreeable things made agreeable outcomes for people mad at your words. I mean offensive in the broadest possible definition here; more plainly, they'll be perceived negatively by someone with enough motivation to be nasty and often it's not worth the trouble of dealing with someone who woke up feeling nasty. We live in a world where people think it's okay to read into the words (and lives) of others, try to derive deep meaning out of simple actions (even if there is none), and where people believe you're lying by default (as a leader). The fact is, as time has gone on confirmation of these things in various people and businesses builds, so they're hard assuations to just toss aside. Therefore, it is most safe to type a paragraph giving direction, listing accomplishments, and thanking entities that helped you along the way in the most taste-free way one can, while saying absolutely nothing at all.
- romanhn 5y agoYou're absolutely right, though is this case even the taste-free text is offending enough people. Being a leader means you'll offend someone, so it becomes an exercise in whom you're ok with offending.
- barelysapient 5y agoThis is written in Protect-The-Stock-Price::English; a late post-modern dialect of American English distinctive for its bold and verbose phrases that are also in-explicitly devoid of any substance. We're confident that intelligent audience members, like yourself OP, can appreciate the large amounts of money and diverse political sensitivities that our communication must be careful to navigate. And while we respectfully regret any discomfort you might have experienced, we hope that you find joy in our future communications.
- freewilly1040 5y agoThe mind numbing boringness is entirely the point. The real message is that there’s nothing to see here, everyone is on the same page, everyone loves the successor, if you’re an investor or an employee this is definitely not an event that should make you reconsider your relationship with the company.
- shp0ngle 5y agoIf you don’t want to read this type of stuff, don’t read corporate blogs. Especially CEO posts. That’s easy.
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- nickthemagicman 5y agoYoooooooooooo homies. I'm dippin out! Tom the new homie now. This a legit cruise. One love to y'all. Always remember, Snitches get stitches. Peace out braphogs. -Phat Nat
- agumonkey 5y agoI can be subject to similar views at times but here it's just the usual leaving message. Just like on the Firefox release, people should chill out. I guess the global context is getting to people's head.