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Congrats to the founders but honestly feel bad for the team. Hearing so many not good things coming from inside AWS these days. Place sounds like a total mess.

by cmiles8 2mo ago

Congrats to the founders but honestly feel bad for the team. Hearing so many not good things coming from inside AWS these days. Place sounds like a total mess. Seems like a constant stream of top talent fleeing on my LinkedIn this past year. I hope they just let the team carry on and don’t contaminate it with all the other craziness going on.

wpietri 2mo ago
I started using DuckDB last year and I loved it. Small, focused, crackling with competence, no bullshit. I think what I liked about it had a lot to do with it being made by a small group of technical people who weren't interested in "maximizing share holder value" (that is, maximizing executive promotions and bonuses). Maybe this will be the rare case where founders survive corporate shenanigans and keep on doing their thing. But I'm bummed, as I've heard that optimism many more times than I've seen it happen.
rklaehn 2mo ago
They built something amazing and now have a nice exit. The code remains open under a non profit foundation. I don't think it is that bad. If working conditions are too bad people will just quit and work for the foundation.
- shimman 2mo ago
  You make it sound like every worker agreed with this. Is this actually true or is it more about the founders exploiting their workers by selling out to one of the most devious anti-worker tech corporations? Is profit sharing, like what you're implying, actually happening? If so, in what quantity?
- eikenberry 2mo ago
  An exit can be a nice payout, but only retirement level payouts for a very few. Most will need to find a new job and the market is pretty shit right now and I doubt the foundation has the funds to hire the entire team back.
- gcarvalho 2mo ago
  What does AWS get out of this? Couldn't they build their own offering on top of DuckDB, just like MotherDuck has been doing? Buying the team and having them all quit is such a bad outcome for AWS, especially they would not keep any of the IP, which is owned by the DuckDB Foundation. I don't think they would be that short-sighted.
- 7e 2mo ago
  There is no guarantee of a nice exit.
- cmiles8 2mo ago
  While the full details aren’t publicly known these sort of “exits” are generally not home runs for most team members. They’ll get some payout but hardly life changing and will get absorbed into BigCo still needing to find a new job if they don’t stay on. These kind of arrangements generally get the investors their money back plus a modest return. The employees generally don’t get much, relative to the risk they took.
eitally 2mo ago
Honestly, there's just a huge amount of thrash across the cloud & SaaS industries as a whole. It's not a lot better at Google (way behind OAI & Anthropic on coding & local AI harnesses), Microsoft (no meaningful frontier model R&D to speak of, and a constantly eroding Windows business), the neoclouds (impossible to source adequate infrastructure and are existentially threatened by the hyperscalers (especially Google) if they can't keep up with demand, chipmakers (NVIDIA vs AMD vs Qualcomm vs Apple vs the long tail of specialty shops like Cerebras), data center pure plays (legislative & community pushback, natural resources, infrastructure availability), and the SaaS folks ("let's see if AI can do it"). It's both a great time to be gold mining in tech, and also a terrible time to be a bit employee.
- hodgesrm 2mo ago
  I've been in Bay Area tech for 35+ years and this pretty much sums it up. AI has upset software economics at multiple levels, including forcing an increasing number of companies out of business. On the other hand it's hard to imagine a better time if you like new technology and have the grit required to win in very competitive markets.
dgudkov 2mo ago
> Place sounds like a total mess. What big corp is not a total mess?
- nostrebored 2mo ago
  AWS in large pockets was not a mess 10 years ago. The things I hear from recent AWS departures are very concerning.
  - voiceeh 2mo ago
    I left AWS recently, but I don't think the entire place is a mess. It really depends on the team. On my team we were expected to work 90+ hours a week, and were told we were slackers if we were unwilling to work Sunday afternoons. But I've heard from others that some teams are a lot better.
    - nostrebored 2mo ago
      Many Amazon teams have had high expectations for work. The stories I’ve heard have largely been around how AI is used, slipping CR standards, and what is funded.
shermantanktop 2mo ago
Does LinkedIn activity paint an accurate picture of wherever you work? I can’t say that’s true for me and my company. It’s not all lies or anything, it’s a fragmented view that emphasizes conflict and the most visible 10% of what the company actually does.
sharts 2mo ago
AWS has always sounded bad for over a decade.

by cmiles8 2mo ago

wpietri 2mo ago

I started using DuckDB last year and I loved it. Small, focused, crackling with competence, no bullshit. I think what I liked about it had a lot to do with it being made by a small group of technical people who weren't interested in "maximizing share holder value" (that is, maximizing executive promotions and bonuses). Maybe this will be the rare case where founders survive corporate shenanigans and keep on doing their thing. But I'm bummed, as I've heard that optimism many more times than I've seen it happen.

rklaehn 2mo ago

They built something amazing and now have a nice exit. The code remains open under a non profit foundation. I don't think it is that bad. If working conditions are too bad people will just quit and work for the foundation.

shimman 2mo ago
You make it sound like every worker agreed with this. Is this actually true or is it more about the founders exploiting their workers by selling out to one of the most devious anti-worker tech corporations? Is profit sharing, like what you're implying, actually happening? If so, in what quantity?
eikenberry 2mo ago
An exit can be a nice payout, but only retirement level payouts for a very few. Most will need to find a new job and the market is pretty shit right now and I doubt the foundation has the funds to hire the entire team back.
gcarvalho 2mo ago
What does AWS get out of this? Couldn't they build their own offering on top of DuckDB, just like MotherDuck has been doing? Buying the team and having them all quit is such a bad outcome for AWS, especially they would not keep any of the IP, which is owned by the DuckDB Foundation. I don't think they would be that short-sighted.
7e 2mo ago
There is no guarantee of a nice exit.
cmiles8 2mo ago
While the full details aren’t publicly known these sort of “exits” are generally not home runs for most team members. They’ll get some payout but hardly life changing and will get absorbed into BigCo still needing to find a new job if they don’t stay on. These kind of arrangements generally get the investors their money back plus a modest return. The employees generally don’t get much, relative to the risk they took.

eitally 2mo ago

Honestly, there's just a huge amount of thrash across the cloud & SaaS industries as a whole. It's not a lot better at Google (way behind OAI & Anthropic on coding & local AI harnesses), Microsoft (no meaningful frontier model R&D to speak of, and a constantly eroding Windows business), the neoclouds (impossible to source adequate infrastructure and are existentially threatened by the hyperscalers (especially Google) if they can't keep up with demand, chipmakers (NVIDIA vs AMD vs Qualcomm vs Apple vs the long tail of specialty shops like Cerebras), data center pure plays (legislative & community pushback, natural resources, infrastructure availability), and the SaaS folks ("let's see if AI can do it"). It's both a great time to be gold mining in tech, and also a terrible time to be a bit employee.

hodgesrm 2mo ago
I've been in Bay Area tech for 35+ years and this pretty much sums it up. AI has upset software economics at multiple levels, including forcing an increasing number of companies out of business. On the other hand it's hard to imagine a better time if you like new technology and have the grit required to win in very competitive markets.

dgudkov 2mo ago

> Place sounds like a total mess. What big corp is not a total mess?

nostrebored 2mo ago
AWS in large pockets was not a mess 10 years ago. The things I hear from recent AWS departures are very concerning.
- voiceeh 2mo ago
  I left AWS recently, but I don't think the entire place is a mess. It really depends on the team. On my team we were expected to work 90+ hours a week, and were told we were slackers if we were unwilling to work Sunday afternoons. But I've heard from others that some teams are a lot better.
  - nostrebored 2mo ago
    Many Amazon teams have had high expectations for work. The stories I’ve heard have largely been around how AI is used, slipping CR standards, and what is funded.

shermantanktop 2mo ago

Does LinkedIn activity paint an accurate picture of wherever you work? I can’t say that’s true for me and my company. It’s not all lies or anything, it’s a fragmented view that emphasizes conflict and the most visible 10% of what the company actually does.

sharts 2mo ago

AWS has always sounded bad for over a decade.