Re:WeWork and Counterfeit Capitalism
by asveikau on Wednesday September 25, 2019 @04:30PM
(#21075033)
I was coming here to see if there were any comments on this and if I might leave one.
It seems like a sketchy real estate company is a little bit less consequential than a medical device that doesn't work (potentially killing people).
But I find the two points interesting as: What will it take for the Silicon Valley community to start being openly critical of a company and that's OK?
For example if you leave comments on here that are skeptical of any given company or its prospects, even rightfully so, you may get a lot of push-back and people assuming you're some kind of mean jerk. But once the founders are shown to be actual frauds, the tone changes to what it might have been in the first place, had we had a bit more healthy skepticism and less "ra-ra, new companies good" kind of blind faith.
In that I rate Theranos and WeWork to have something in common. They tipped these ocassionaly overly polite scales towards admitting that some companies act in bad faith.
It seems like a sketchy real estate company is a little bit less consequential than a medical device that doesn't work (potentially killing people).
But I find the two points interesting as: What will it take for the Silicon Valley community to start being openly critical of a company and that's OK?
For example if you leave comments on here that are skeptical of any given company or its prospects, even rightfully so, you may get a lot of push-back and people assuming you're some kind of mean jerk. But once the founders are shown to be actual frauds, the tone changes to what it might have been in the first place, had we had a bit more healthy skepticism and less "ra-ra, new companies good" kind of blind faith.
In that I rate Theranos and WeWork to have something in common. They tipped these ocassionaly overly polite scales towards admitting that some companies act in bad faith.