Theranos, CEO Holmes, and Former President Balwani Charged with Fraud

Re:Theranos, CEO Holmes, and Former President Balwani Charge... by wpietri on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @02:34PM (#16587148)

I think the Concierge and Wizard of Oz approaches [1] are just one thing people mean by "fake it 'til you make it", but I definitely don't think they're the most common meaning.

Startups engage in all sorts of puffery, trying to project the appearance of success long before they have actual success. Fancy websites, fancy offices, sales and investment pitches that cherry pick stories, numbers, and milestones that give an enormously positive impression of what's generally a very bumpy reality.

I personally don't like that, but the game is the game. But it's very easy for that puffery to slide over into outright fraud when things get desperate. Which is why I'm so glad that the SEC is going after Theranos with great vigor. Hopefully these clowns will end up sharing a cell with Shkreli, giving every would-be startup CEO a clear example of what happens when they push it too far.

[1] https://www.allencheng.com/concierge-mvp/

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Re:Theranos, CEO Holmes, and Former President Balwani Charge... by sgt101 on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @05:26PM (#16588438)

This is fine when the elements of automation aren't beyond the state of the art. However when you have startups like Spinvox et-al hoping that automated transcription will show up and save them (I mean transcription of variety of voice in variety of environments, using uncharacterized microphones and transcoded from mobile to core ect) or the current rash of chatbot liars and charlatans then real real damage gets done to real companies where execs believe the trendy w*nkers vs real people who understand technology. I've seen good engineers hounded out and scores of millions of pounds wasted because of "warp drive over powerpoint" and I've had enough. Not that I'm bitter or anything.

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Re:Theranos, CEO Holmes, and Former President Balwani Charge... by wpietri on Friday March 16, 2018 @10:07AM (#16600723)

Yeah, same.

And it can even be fine when things are beyond the state of the art, as long as the CEO has the bravery to look reality in the face and either a) find another way, or b) say "sorry, startups are gambles, and this one's a busted flush".

And it's the liars and charlatans that really get to me. I figure it's at least 30% likely that I'll end up in jail because somebody says "blockchain" to me one too many times regarding some application which would be better off done with a MySQL database.

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Re:Theranos, CEO Holmes, and Former President Balwani Charge... by goatherders on Wednesday March 14, 2018 @09:17PM (#16589797)

Isn't uber just waiting for automated drivers (self driving cars) to show up and save them? I have three businesses at the moment that all use people to do things that maybe one day can be solved by AI/tech. My customers don't care how I get it done and aren't impressed by tech anyway. If automation shows up and helps me then my margins go through the roof. But as it is, the margins are pretty good anyway.

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