3 ms·

This. A thousand times this. Oh, and offer me as much salary as you can with the option for me to dial that back into equity. I can't pay a mortgage or buy piz

by Symbol 15y ago

This. A thousand times this. Oh, and offer me as much salary as you can with the option for me to dial that back into equity. I can't pay a mortgage or buy pizza with options, and my market rate does not fluctuate based on how much buzz you have on twitter.

fleitz 15y ago
The Goodfellas school of startups. The founders' got Pauli as an engineer, any problems, he goes to Pauli, problems with EC2, he can go to pauli, troubles with rails, hard drives, Linux, he can go to Pauli, but now he's gotta come up with Pauli's money every week, no matter what. Your tweet didn't go viral? Sorry to hear about that, fuck you pay me. Your funding didn't come through? Fuck you, pay me. People don't need more coupons? Fuck you, pay me. Servers crashed in the middle of the night? Fuck you, pay me. And then finally when there's nothing left and he can't raise another dime from the VC, or clear anymore paper on second market, you bust the joint out, take the code and release it as open source. If founders actually believed their option bullshit it would be a no brainer to keep those valuable options and pay engineers 200K. There is no shortage of engineers, only a shortage of suckers.
- 9999 15y ago
  Your goodfellas analogy is pretty close to perfect (and I know quite a few paulis myself, hell, I'm a Pauli). That being said, the author's suggestion of a vastly larger amount of equity with the right founders in place might convince me. But .25? Even 3? Fuck that, pay me.
- rdl 15y ago
  I think VCs usually value successful startups much more highly than engineers do, so I'd probably raise more from VCs (which has some other benefits), and pay higher cash compensation (or other compensation, like profit sharing/revenue sharing, benefits, nicer office, etc.) in place of above-market equity grants. It really depends on the individuals, though.

by Symbol 15y ago

fleitz 15y ago

The Goodfellas school of startups. The founders' got Pauli as an engineer, any problems, he goes to Pauli, problems with EC2, he can go to pauli, troubles with rails, hard drives, Linux, he can go to Pauli, but now he's gotta come up with Pauli's money every week, no matter what. Your tweet didn't go viral? Sorry to hear about that, fuck you pay me. Your funding didn't come through? Fuck you, pay me. People don't need more coupons? Fuck you, pay me. Servers crashed in the middle of the night? Fuck you, pay me. And then finally when there's nothing left and he can't raise another dime from the VC, or clear anymore paper on second market, you bust the joint out, take the code and release it as open source. If founders actually believed their option bullshit it would be a no brainer to keep those valuable options and pay engineers 200K. There is no shortage of engineers, only a shortage of suckers.

9999 15y ago
Your goodfellas analogy is pretty close to perfect (and I know quite a few paulis myself, hell, I'm a Pauli). That being said, the author's suggestion of a vastly larger amount of equity with the right founders in place might convince me. But .25? Even 3? Fuck that, pay me.
rdl 15y ago
I think VCs usually value successful startups much more highly than engineers do, so I'd probably raise more from VCs (which has some other benefits), and pay higher cash compensation (or other compensation, like profit sharing/revenue sharing, benefits, nicer office, etc.) in place of above-market equity grants. It really depends on the individuals, though.