> A constant reminder to keep the people who don't know what they are doing (including the owners of the company!) from the social media.

I'm just guessing based on the contents of the article, but it sounds like a typical "hard-fist founder-run company" so good luck convincing the founder to not sit on social media and argue their points.

also known as the 'double down on stupid' and 'triple down on stupid'

This is known as the “Randy Pitchford” social media strat.

We recently had an example of that with Automattic and the WordPress drama. Where the founder was here on HN hurting his own legal case despite people here repeatedly told him to stop posting for his own sake and asking him to talk to his lawyers.

Seeing someone post here a screenshot of case filings that included a screenshot of that founder's HN comments thereafter was golden.

If you want an extreme example of this; go look at the Sacramento startup Sircles. 7+ year old "startup" that has sub $100k revenue after several years but 9 million in debt. The founder has an account there under u/Sirclesapp where he goes off on toxic and insane tirades to anyone who dares say anything but utmost praise at his app. Apparently he stalks their reddit accounts and sends threatening letters to their personal home addresses from his lawyer for "defamation". That I understand he sent one to some ex employees and one to some woman who I think is a paralegal and is now suing them in civil court.

He partnered with some radio program called radradio where the host had a lot of personal issues and the show ultimately got axed. The radio host was known for having issues with alcohol, but they kept partnering with him because he kept shilling their WeFunder. They've raised over $6m in SAFEs but considering they are $9m in debt, haven't broken $100k lifetime revenue after 7 years, and seem to have over a million a year burn rate, it's doubtful that the shares from those SAFEs (if ever executed) would ever be in the money.

Wow, it seems like the whole purpose of the product is grievance based against yelp. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a fan of yelp, but I get the vibe that maybe this person would be even more extractive if given the opportunity

> [...] go look at the Sacramento startup Sircles. 7+ year old "startup" that has sub $100k revenue after several years but 9 million in debt.

Going on a tangent:

Depending on your industry, taking a while to see any revenue is common. Eg look into biotech or the people trying to make atomic fusion a reality.

Debt is just as valid a way to finance your company as equity is. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modigliani%E2%80%93Miller_theo... for the theory.

> Depending on your industry, taking a while to see any revenue is common.

That is true. But Sircles, which appears to be just another social recommendation app, is not in one of those industries.

Oh, even without looking into it, I would assume that Sircles is probably pretty dodgy. I just meant that SacToHacker's original points against it aren't necessarily bad. But can be damning in the context of their industry, yes!

True. and a screwdriver is as just a valid tool as a hammer. Though their use isn’t always interchangeable .

This is cool. Love little tangential info bombs like this. Thanks.

Cool but Sircles isn't a biotech company. It's a social network. They arn't "trying to make atomic fusion a reality" either.

Oh, definitely. I was just nerding out about finance.

Yes, Sircles is probably pretty dodgy.

That is cool! Sorry for nerding out just then.

I’m from Sacramento and I know of people who worked at Sircles. It’s comically mismanaged and run by a comic book villian.

They also made sloppy mistakes like naming the Proven owner's partner un-redacted in a document they submitted to the court (which is then available through legal search engines). If they were concerned with privacy they could easily have withheld her name.

The one time security through obscurity would have helped them?

That would be more like: shuffling that document randomly between other documents, or using white font on a white page in Word.

Obscurity is often a valid security tactic, just not all the time and never by itself.

Guy who paid someone to throw a brick through his ex wife's window is insensed at being intimidated.

There is delicious irony in the owner of a lock company being so insecure.

The company who sued him is, still, embarrassingly, attempting to hold a social media presence, despite getting exposed as fraudsters and bullies:

https://m.youtube.com/@provenindustries8236

> Proven Is so secure that if they detect a robber trying to lock pick they sue them.

Incredible

That article just kept getting better and better.

Also:

> “Sucks to see how many people take everything they see online for face value,” one Proven employee wrote. “Sounds like a bunch of liberals lol.”

So when a great product is not a great product, it turns out to be great alone for the fact of being built by republicans.

I think their point was that the lock picking videos were faked. But it’s still a silly comment from the Proven employee.

I’ve also seen people use “liberal” as a literal curse word before. On one “reality show”, a member of the cast broke down while highly intoxicated and started screaming at other people saying:

“You’re worse than a beep! You’re a liberal”

It’s insane just how far the political divide has become.

Othering is easier than improving. An old philosophy professor taught me that at a community college when we started getting on the subject of philosophy in politics. This was probably 20-something years ago, now, but one of the many things that stuck with me from his teaching, and makes even more sense now than it did then.

Surely this philosophy has great value if you still believe your adversary is misguided but still well-intentionned

But if your adversary is lying knowingly to everyone saying you are a criminal and should be locked up or deported then I wonder what's there to improve

The game of cooperation only works if you're not playing with someone who is constantly trying to exploit your cooperation attempts

Surely both sides are responsible even though it only started happening once a certain political figure popped up started calling his meekest opponents murderers and criminals and having crowds chant for them to be locked up

You're right, it's the other side that's feeding the political divide!

It's not the other side who is feeding the political divide but it definitely is the other side who has been escalating the aggressiveness ("the rethoric")

Is “Basket of Deplorables” ringing any bells?

This was a once unscripted statement that she never repeated again her entire campaign. She expressed regret immediately after making it (not after losing) explaining how it was grossly generalistic but stood by that it does describe a large chunk of Trump's base.

Can you name one time Trump immediately regretted what he said about the Left and explained that it was an overgeneralization? Also again, in Clinton's case it was a single unscripted statement. By contrast Trump has a pattern of calling opponents vermin, the anti-christ, evil, warning of a bloodbath to come... Yea the left's attacks on the right just don't seem nearly as bad especially if it is just being called "deplorable" once. I could write a book that is just hateful Trump quotes. Ganna print it and give it to my son one day as inspiration for how to be an honourable leader. /s

I say all this as a Canadian that would have voted for Trump in 2016 if I could have.

That was proven correct, so what are you saying the problem is?

If I remember right, she said that half his supporters were a basket of deplorables. This right after a study was published suggesting that about half of conservatives were unconsciously racist.

So she wasn't wrong, but saying that out loud was pretty stupid.

So calling your opponent's supporters stupid (or whatever was meant) is the same than calling for your opponent's arrest ?

It rings less bells than “I love the uneducated” and “grab them by the pussy” if we are talking about gross things said by powerful politicians. For me, at least.

I wouldn’t say it’s a recent phenomenon. It’s just reached absurd levels.

As for who’s responsible, there’s plenty of blame to go around. However it’s hard to deny that conduct of one party is far far less professional than the other party.

I honestly think politicians should be thrown in jail for lying. But that will never happen because they’re all too busy being corrupt; the entire lot of them.

Yeah, I noticed that. I’d put money on not a single person in this whole dispute being a liberal at all.

That was probably the final straw for me. Well, one of the final straws. Imagine trying to politicise this.

Shushh, don't tell people about Streisand Effect.

One thing Proven might have done is to analyze the attack. Then see if the lock could be improved to prevent it. Offer exchanges for the old locks (most of which are unlikely to be requested). Instead they resort to Lawyers, refuse to solve the problem and waste everyones time and money.