4 ms·

Agreed on all counts. Never heard of him until the news he was fired from MS, read his goodbye blog post that was pretty Microsoft-friendly, and threw up in my

by endtime 17y ago

Agreed on all counts. Never heard of him until the news he was fired from MS, read his goodbye blog post that was pretty Microsoft-friendly, and threw up in my mouth a little when I saw this new one. I'm sure Don's done some good work, but based on the exposure I have to him (the two aforementioned blog posts) I find it hard to respect the guy.

jey 17y ago
I agree that it looks pretty bad, but for the sake of playing Devil's, er, Don's Advocate: maybe he was feeling down from being unexpectedly let go from MSFT, and is now having a rebound where everything about his new job looks extra rosy? Just saying there's a human/personal element at play here too.
- Keyframe 17y ago
  You might be right, but he could've handled this with more professionalism.
- endtime 17y ago
  I can understand feeling down after being fired. I can't understand magically having opinions opposite to those you held when employed by your new employer's competitor. The flippant and unprofessional tone just exacerbates the problem.
  - seldo 17y ago
    I don't think any of his opinions expressed are actually a turnaround from his previous statements. He used to talk about the good things at Microsoft and not mention the bad things. Now he is talking about the good things at Google (with comparison to bad things at Microsoft), and not mentioning the bad things at Google (which I won't attempt to enumerate, since I work at Yahoo). I think he is just trying to remain upbeat about his sudden and clearly quite wrenching departure from a job he loved at a company he respected.
bootload 17y ago
"... Agreed on all counts. Never heard of him until the news he was fired from MS, read his goodbye blog post that was pretty Microsoft-friendly, and threw up in my mouth a little when I saw this new one. ..." Which means you probably didn't look very hard. "... The companies were much higher quality than I expected. The founders were nearly all coders and hackers but did a surprisingly good job at presenting their idea, target market, and business model ..." ~ Don Dodge Don was around YC around 2 years ago and while initially thinking the YC model was a joke, he changed his mind by observing. That's what you want isn't it? People think one thing, but change their minds after observing. Fluid thinking instead of fixed mindsets. ~ http://searchyc.com/don+dodge+bootload http://searchyc.com/don+dodge+bootload
- endtime 17y ago
  >Which means you probably didn't look very hard. Because I've only seen these two blog posts? I'm not sufficiently interested in Don Dodge to spend time researching him; and even if I were, a lifetime of washing oil off baby seals wouldn't change the issues I have with his blog post. >Don was around YC around 2 years ago and while initially thinking the YC model was a joke, he changed his mind by observing. That's what you want isn't it? People think one thing, but change their minds after observing. Fluid thinking instead of fixed mindsets. You can't honestly think that this blog post is the result of a reasonable change of mind after gaining new information. It's a complete and utter reversal of his stances on publicly available products he'd already used.

by endtime 17y ago

jey 17y ago

I agree that it looks pretty bad, but for the sake of playing Devil's, er, Don's Advocate: maybe he was feeling down from being unexpectedly let go from MSFT, and is now having a rebound where everything about his new job looks extra rosy? Just saying there's a human/personal element at play here too.

Keyframe 17y ago
You might be right, but he could've handled this with more professionalism.
endtime 17y ago
I can understand feeling down after being fired. I can't understand magically having opinions opposite to those you held when employed by your new employer's competitor. The flippant and unprofessional tone just exacerbates the problem.
- seldo 17y ago
  I don't think any of his opinions expressed are actually a turnaround from his previous statements. He used to talk about the good things at Microsoft and not mention the bad things. Now he is talking about the good things at Google (with comparison to bad things at Microsoft), and not mentioning the bad things at Google (which I won't attempt to enumerate, since I work at Yahoo). I think he is just trying to remain upbeat about his sudden and clearly quite wrenching departure from a job he loved at a company he respected.

bootload 17y ago

"... Agreed on all counts. Never heard of him until the news he was fired from MS, read his goodbye blog post that was pretty Microsoft-friendly, and threw up in my mouth a little when I saw this new one. ..." Which means you probably didn't look very hard. "... The companies were much higher quality than I expected. The founders were nearly all coders and hackers but did a surprisingly good job at presenting their idea, target market, and business model ..." ~ Don Dodge Don was around YC around 2 years ago and while initially thinking the YC model was a joke, he changed his mind by observing. That's what you want isn't it? People think one thing, but change their minds after observing. Fluid thinking instead of fixed mindsets. ~ http://searchyc.com/don+dodge+bootload http://searchyc.com/don+dodge+bootload

endtime 17y ago
>Which means you probably didn't look very hard. Because I've only seen these two blog posts? I'm not sufficiently interested in Don Dodge to spend time researching him; and even if I were, a lifetime of washing oil off baby seals wouldn't change the issues I have with his blog post. >Don was around YC around 2 years ago and while initially thinking the YC model was a joke, he changed his mind by observing. That's what you want isn't it? People think one thing, but change their minds after observing. Fluid thinking instead of fixed mindsets. You can't honestly think that this blog post is the result of a reasonable change of mind after gaining new information. It's a complete and utter reversal of his stances on publicly available products he'd already used.