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There's no way to write a law like this that isn't open to horrific abuse. If investors are going to be held responsible for their management's criminal activit

There's no way to write a law like this that isn't open to horrific abuse. If investors are going to be held responsible for their management's criminal activities, the law isn't just going to be used in Silicon Valley. I don't want to be held liable the next time I buy a few hundred shares of a company whose managers fuck up and (defraud mortgage borrowers|turn NJ into a superfund site|whatever). I'm generally very supportive of your observations about the feudal nature of Silicon Valley -- but this isn't one of your finest moments.

RodericDay 12y ago
> "I don't want to be held liable the next time I buy a few hundred shares of a company whose managers fuck up" how is this fair? we want investors to make intelligent decisions, right? not just play roulette?
- michaelochurch 12y ago
  No, I actually agree with him insofar as such a law would require a definition of "investor" that doesn't hold small, passive investors responsible. If you're a VC and you fund a frat boy and he creates a discriminatory culture, you should be held financially liable for any sexual harassment cases that come against him, because you created the startup (and, often, his career) and you were his manager, even if the corporate structure allows you to deny the fact on technicalities. (At least, let me go this far: you should be as liable as his manager would be, meaning that you fall hard if you knew or should have known.) If you're an employee who exercised his options, you shouldn't be liable for management's fuckups.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
michaelochurch 12y ago
I'm not talking about applying the law to everyone who owns shares. That would be ridiculous, and would take down a large number of employees. I should have clarified. I want career-making, lead investors to be liable. The people who created Evan Spiegel should be held responsible if he creates a company with a discriminatory culture. Not everyone who holds a few hundred shares; just people who either played a role, by investing, in creating the thing. In other words, investor-bosses, not all investors. I wouldn't necessarily apply this to all crimes and, in fact, I'd be willing to have a law that only applies to civil claims, since civil court is where most of these cultural failures end up. I'm not going to say that I know all the details of how it should work; only that something needs to hold investors, as managers because that is what they are, responsible for the cultures of the companies they create.
- pen2l 12y ago
  > The people who created Evan Spiegel should be held responsible if he creates a company with a discriminatory culture. You know that that's not happening though, right? I mean, the idea is so far-fetched and unrealistic that it's comical. The first step would be to merely hold Spiegel responsible for what he did: aaaand nothing is happening. Nothing will ever happen. But you want to go two steps ahead and hold investors responsible for Spiegel's behavior? That's laughably naive. Consider, for example, that one of Reddit's big investors is a pimp. No, that's not a fucking joke. He was straight up selling women's bodies to be used sexually. We're not holding people who sell women's bodies for sex accountable... and yet you want to go a few steps further and hold people responsible for other people's conduct?
  - sokoloff 12y ago
    Is there an assertion that Spiegel has actually created a discriminatory culture at Snapchat? Or are we leaping to that conclusion based on idiotic emails he wrote in his late teens/early 20s in college and the notion that a leopard doesn't change his spots? Might we expect that a CEO would act differently in his company than a fraternity social chair? If he's kept it up and continues to act in that same way as CEO, by all means hold him responsible (he presumably reports to the board). Trying to hold a lead investor/VC responsible is not going to be workable in the small and certainly not in the general case. Absent a specific, current claim, I'll give him enough credit to evaluate his current actions and not hold him to account for emails that surfaced from years ago and in a completely different context (even though I find the emails appalling).
  - mikerichards 12y ago
    michaelochurch is part of the "spread the blame as far and as wide as possible" culture. "Others must be punished" if they just happen to know someone. There's a political agenda behind all of this that I don't need to get into.
  - michaelochurch 12y ago
    But you want to go two steps ahead and hold investors responsible for Spiegel's behavior? That's laughably naive. Oh, it probably is. Someone has to propose radical ideas or moderate changes never happen. Radicalism is the role I've had to take on these issues, for a variety of reasons not worth getting into. To be honest, I'm nearly burnt out on the anti-VC radicalism. And my actual views are fairly moderate, not that I can express nuance in a world full of corporate apologists (Valley libertarians) who worship money/success regardless of its origin, and who have to have their idols crushed. See, I have a good job, a good life, and I find that I care less about VC and stupid techie tricks by the year. I prefer to learn about Haskell or new machine learning techniques; that's a lot more intellectually stimulating than "VC-istan". That said, a replacement for me on the anti-VC radicalism front hasn't emerged. I'd love to find one so I can play the moderate. There's a value in being a screaming maniac, which is that your words echo in your adversaries' minds in their moments of doubt and darkness, which means that you have a chance at planting in them the seeds that take them down for good... but I prefer the moderate stance when possible. We just need a really effective screaming maniac because, even if they aren't much for nuance, they have important morale effects in terms of galvanizing the good and shaking the bad. Right now, I haven't met anyone who can and will do what I do on HN. Consider, for example, that one of Reddit's big investors is a pimp. No, that's not a fucking joke. He was straight up selling women's bodies to be used sexually. We're not holding people who sell women's bodies for sex accountable... Whoa. Can you say who? I've never heard of this. That is... disgusting and horrifying. I think we probably agree that such people should be held accountable.

RodericDay 12y ago

> "I don't want to be held liable the next time I buy a few hundred shares of a company whose managers fuck up" how is this fair? we want investors to make intelligent decisions, right? not just play roulette?

michaelochurch 12y ago
No, I actually agree with him insofar as such a law would require a definition of "investor" that doesn't hold small, passive investors responsible. If you're a VC and you fund a frat boy and he creates a discriminatory culture, you should be held financially liable for any sexual harassment cases that come against him, because you created the startup (and, often, his career) and you were his manager, even if the corporate structure allows you to deny the fact on technicalities. (At least, let me go this far: you should be as liable as his manager would be, meaning that you fall hard if you knew or should have known.) If you're an employee who exercised his options, you shouldn't be liable for management's fuckups.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

michaelochurch 12y ago

I'm not talking about applying the law to everyone who owns shares. That would be ridiculous, and would take down a large number of employees. I should have clarified. I want career-making, lead investors to be liable. The people who created Evan Spiegel should be held responsible if he creates a company with a discriminatory culture. Not everyone who holds a few hundred shares; just people who either played a role, by investing, in creating the thing. In other words, investor-bosses, not all investors. I wouldn't necessarily apply this to all crimes and, in fact, I'd be willing to have a law that only applies to civil claims, since civil court is where most of these cultural failures end up. I'm not going to say that I know all the details of how it should work; only that something needs to hold investors, as managers because that is what they are, responsible for the cultures of the companies they create.

pen2l 12y ago
> The people who created Evan Spiegel should be held responsible if he creates a company with a discriminatory culture. You know that that's not happening though, right? I mean, the idea is so far-fetched and unrealistic that it's comical. The first step would be to merely hold Spiegel responsible for what he did: aaaand nothing is happening. Nothing will ever happen. But you want to go two steps ahead and hold investors responsible for Spiegel's behavior? That's laughably naive. Consider, for example, that one of Reddit's big investors is a pimp. No, that's not a fucking joke. He was straight up selling women's bodies to be used sexually. We're not holding people who sell women's bodies for sex accountable... and yet you want to go a few steps further and hold people responsible for other people's conduct?
- sokoloff 12y ago
  Is there an assertion that Spiegel has actually created a discriminatory culture at Snapchat? Or are we leaping to that conclusion based on idiotic emails he wrote in his late teens/early 20s in college and the notion that a leopard doesn't change his spots? Might we expect that a CEO would act differently in his company than a fraternity social chair? If he's kept it up and continues to act in that same way as CEO, by all means hold him responsible (he presumably reports to the board). Trying to hold a lead investor/VC responsible is not going to be workable in the small and certainly not in the general case. Absent a specific, current claim, I'll give him enough credit to evaluate his current actions and not hold him to account for emails that surfaced from years ago and in a completely different context (even though I find the emails appalling).
- mikerichards 12y ago
  michaelochurch is part of the "spread the blame as far and as wide as possible" culture. "Others must be punished" if they just happen to know someone. There's a political agenda behind all of this that I don't need to get into.
- michaelochurch 12y ago
  But you want to go two steps ahead and hold investors responsible for Spiegel's behavior? That's laughably naive. Oh, it probably is. Someone has to propose radical ideas or moderate changes never happen. Radicalism is the role I've had to take on these issues, for a variety of reasons not worth getting into. To be honest, I'm nearly burnt out on the anti-VC radicalism. And my actual views are fairly moderate, not that I can express nuance in a world full of corporate apologists (Valley libertarians) who worship money/success regardless of its origin, and who have to have their idols crushed. See, I have a good job, a good life, and I find that I care less about VC and stupid techie tricks by the year. I prefer to learn about Haskell or new machine learning techniques; that's a lot more intellectually stimulating than "VC-istan". That said, a replacement for me on the anti-VC radicalism front hasn't emerged. I'd love to find one so I can play the moderate. There's a value in being a screaming maniac, which is that your words echo in your adversaries' minds in their moments of doubt and darkness, which means that you have a chance at planting in them the seeds that take them down for good... but I prefer the moderate stance when possible. We just need a really effective screaming maniac because, even if they aren't much for nuance, they have important morale effects in terms of galvanizing the good and shaking the bad. Right now, I haven't met anyone who can and will do what I do on HN. Consider, for example, that one of Reddit's big investors is a pimp. No, that's not a fucking joke. He was straight up selling women's bodies to be used sexually. We're not holding people who sell women's bodies for sex accountable... Whoa. Can you say who? I've never heard of this. That is... disgusting and horrifying. I think we probably agree that such people should be held accountable.