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Full disclosure. I'm a Zynga employee. I run the Boston studio, which was built out of a startup acquisition and is responsible for Adventure World. This commen

by far33d 15y ago

Full disclosure. I'm a Zynga employee. I run the Boston studio, which was built out of a startup acquisition and is responsible for Adventure World. This comment is 100% my own opinion, not that of my employer. I'm an engineer and entrepreneur at heart, a long-time hacker news contributor, and now a GM / product guy. Above all else, I'm not evil. I claim that no one I work with is evil either. It's a shame Shay didn't join Zynga so that he could see how we really operate and how we really think about our players instead of taking on what is essentially an uninformed and cliched conventional wisdom opinion about the company. I don't know anything about contracts, so I have no opinions about that part. I just take issue w/ the last half of his article that slanders me and my team without any first-hand knowledge in order to market his new dev shop.

dollar 15y ago
You mean like demanding employees return their stock options? Yeah, nothing totally despicable about the management of your company, they are all GREAT GUYS!
psykotic 15y ago
> how we really think about our players instead of taking on what is essentially an uninformed and cliched conventional wisdom opinion about the company. Judging a company by what they do publicly rather than what they might say or think privately seems like a smart move on his part. If you want your peers to think better of Zynga, the onus is on you, not them.
eaten_by_a_grue 15y ago
Hahaha. The stock options were already mentioned, so, here's mine: "Hey, let's make a carbon copy of this popular tower game." "Sure! That sits pretty good with me morally."
chernevik 15y ago
You != Zynga. With less than 24 hours to decide -- a timeframe set by Zynga -- what exactly is he supposed to decide on beyond his impressions at the negotiations' start? And he went out of his way to _not_ slander Zynga. He didn't claim to be poorly treated, makes no complaint about Zynga pursuing its own interests. He mentions his respect for a number of your colleagues. He calls the company "evil" but so carefully defines the term that it's clear he means "unsustainable" and "short term cash flow maximizing". You don't agree and that's what makes a market. You want a chance to bridge the gap between your understanding and his? Get on the horn to Corporate, get a carve-out for Connectrode, then call him up and make him an offer, same terms as Monday but without the crazy deadline.
CrownStem 15y ago
"Slander" is a strong word, and most of the folks around here are not idiots- You are not helping your case slinging that accusation around. Tell us exactly what verbage you believe is "slander".
reneherse 15y ago
Well, I'm sure no one following this thread believes you or your team members are individually evil. It's the public actions of the company you work for that many object to. To employ a bit of basic systems thinking, "the purpose of a system is what it does." When it comes to the actions of this system named Zynga, intentions don't matter. Only actions and effects. In this context, the purpose of Zynga is to clone other developers' games. To create addictive positive feedback loops that exploit players lacking in self control. To ignore/break my iOS notification settings (OK, a mere personal gripe). ETC. Is that the whole story? Of course not. But a system that does these things was put in place by humans, and a lot of other humans think it's a nasty way of business.

by far33d 15y ago

dollar 15y ago

You mean like demanding employees return their stock options? Yeah, nothing totally despicable about the management of your company, they are all GREAT GUYS!

psykotic 15y ago

> how we really think about our players instead of taking on what is essentially an uninformed and cliched conventional wisdom opinion about the company. Judging a company by what they do publicly rather than what they might say or think privately seems like a smart move on his part. If you want your peers to think better of Zynga, the onus is on you, not them.

eaten_by_a_grue 15y ago

Hahaha. The stock options were already mentioned, so, here's mine: "Hey, let's make a carbon copy of this popular tower game." "Sure! That sits pretty good with me morally."

chernevik 15y ago

You != Zynga. With less than 24 hours to decide -- a timeframe set by Zynga -- what exactly is he supposed to decide on beyond his impressions at the negotiations' start? And he went out of his way to _not_ slander Zynga. He didn't claim to be poorly treated, makes no complaint about Zynga pursuing its own interests. He mentions his respect for a number of your colleagues. He calls the company "evil" but so carefully defines the term that it's clear he means "unsustainable" and "short term cash flow maximizing". You don't agree and that's what makes a market. You want a chance to bridge the gap between your understanding and his? Get on the horn to Corporate, get a carve-out for Connectrode, then call him up and make him an offer, same terms as Monday but without the crazy deadline.

CrownStem 15y ago

"Slander" is a strong word, and most of the folks around here are not idiots- You are not helping your case slinging that accusation around. Tell us exactly what verbage you believe is "slander".

reneherse 15y ago

Well, I'm sure no one following this thread believes you or your team members are individually evil. It's the public actions of the company you work for that many object to. To employ a bit of basic systems thinking, "the purpose of a system is what it does." When it comes to the actions of this system named Zynga, intentions don't matter. Only actions and effects. In this context, the purpose of Zynga is to clone other developers' games. To create addictive positive feedback loops that exploit players lacking in self control. To ignore/break my iOS notification settings (OK, a mere personal gripe). ETC. Is that the whole story? Of course not. But a system that does these things was put in place by humans, and a lot of other humans think it's a nasty way of business.