What The New York Times Didn't Say About Amazon - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@jaycarney/what-the-new-york-times-didn-t-tell-you-a1128aa78931 <comment><USER2> I recently quit Amazon.

I don't doubt that New York Times purposely misrepresented or omitted facts to make this story. Their stories tend to be very agenda driven and the facts tend to be subservient to the narrative, a policy which is deemed acceptable because it "starts a conversation" or the story is "probably true for someone". This is typical of the left wing.

However, I did in fact have an absolutely awful experience at Amazon, in AWS specifically. It really is an awful place to work where management is entirely ego driven and in cover your ass mode 24/7 to the supreme detriment of everyone involved. Subordinates are seen as drones who should work without appreciation or thought for self. And the idea that subordinates are not drones is considered un-Amazonian.

I did in fact witness someone cry at their desk. Well, they didn't cry, it was more like they were in an emotionally precarious daze after being berated for 30 minutes straight by a manager who only did it to make himself feel better about his own worries about the project.

<comment><USER3> > Their stories tend to be very agenda driven and the facts tend to be > subservient to the narrative, a policy which is deemed acceptable because it > "starts a conversation" or the story is "probably true for someone". This is > typical of the left wing.

This is hardly an issue isolated to "left wing" media.

<comment><USER4> To be fair, when it comes to attacking corporations (biased or not) , this is mostly a left wing media thing.

<comment><USER5> And when it comes to supporting corporations (biased or not), this is mostly a right wing media thing. Just because they do it from opposing sides doesn't make it ok.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There are several shockingly inappropriate things in this article. In particular, the PR person at Amazon is saying that they would have shared employee's personal records (including evaluations) as well as other employee's termination conditions (which I consider unrelated to their quotes).

Amazon: what Carney just posted was very inappropriate. I am completely amazed you did this (assuming it was done with approval at the company level). You should be aware that you will start having serious problems hiring and retaining quality employees if you post things like this about your employees.

<comment><USER7> Devil's Advocate here:

The people named in the article and refuted by Amazon put their personal story a public story.

If someone "slanders" a business it can't reply with evidence? Must the company say it is a personal matter that we can't disclose, which reads they are guilty and don't want the truth to come out?

End of Devil's Advocate

Seems like they were making a statement of if you talk will will fully disclose our information to refute what you said. I think this was hurting Amazon so much that they are willing to payout the "out of court settlement" and "set the record straight."

<comment><USER8> The details provided in the response are probably being disclosed legally (doubt Amazon PR would screw up that badly), but it shows really poor taste that they would even respond to the NYT piece which was pretty clearly hyperbolic, emotional, and somewhat cherrypicked; even more so that they would adopt the same tactics of naming and shaming ex-employees.

The fact that it was also published on medium by the head of PR baffles me - why are they aiming this refutation at the tech crowd that would probably see through this cover-piece pretty easily, instead of getting it into a high- readership, Amazon consumer oriented publication? Poorly planned and executed all around, regardless of legality.

<comment><USER9> The tech crowd (at least on HN) didn't see through the cover-piece...the comments here were overwhelmingly along the lines of "I knew it! Horrible environment". A lot of confirmation of existing anti-Amazon bias.

<comment><USER8> I'm assuming they published it on medium as a blog post targeting the tech community because they were trying to persuade potential future employees that Amazon is a good place to work.

Yet Carney smeared the NYT and ex employees rather than highlighting the positives (I'm sure there are many, but I don't know what they are because he didn't mention them) of working at Amazon.

Better yet, Amazon could have just carried on being a good place to work. If your company is doing good, important things its going to take a lot more than a biased NYT piece to really deflate employee sentiment and drive down the quality of your applicants. "Show not tell" is usually a good principle to operate on.

<comment><USER10> Even before the times article amazon had a rep as a place that ground through people in a year or two.

<comment><USER11> That was my impression and after talking to several friends over there it hasn't exactly gone away. Even people who still work there 5-6 years later give it at best mixed reviews. I don't know how to interpret the mudslinging but I don't think that Amazon is all fun and games.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I love how the start of this article reads like something out of Character Assassination 101.

Step 1: start by bringing up something negative about a person that has absolutely NOTHING to do with the issue at hand.

Okay, so the guy resigned because he did something bad. How does that make what he experienced while there not true? Oh, that's right, it doesn't. And the admission of fraud isn't a "crucial piece of context." You and I both know that. Unfortunately, you think the reader is dumb enough not to know it.

Step 2: Assert statements in the form of a question so that you can deny every making the assertion.

"Did Ms. Kantor's editors at the Times ask her whether Mr. Olson might have an axe to grind?" Here, we don't actually assert that Mr. Olson has an axe to grind. We don't assert he's purposely lying to get revenge. We just highly insinuate it and make the reader believe it by putting it in question form.

This is an obvious attempt at character assassination and to cast doubt in the minds of the reader without actually saying he was lying.

If Mr. Olson is lying - sue him. You're within your rights to do that. But you're not suing him. Or the Times.

So, what's the point of this? Propaganda. And sleazy propaganda at that.

<comment><USER13> > _How does that make what he experienced while there not true?_

It doesn't make it true or false, of course. What it does (if true) is make his report that such a thing happened less credible.

This is because fraud is a form of dishonesty, closely related to the telling of lies.

Also, being fired for wrongdoing (again, if that is true) creates the basis for an obvious bias. A person who was fired for wrongdoing can't be expected to be objective in reporting something about the former employer, even if they aren't trying to deceive. If that person's report is relayed, but the firing is concealed, the journalist is effectively concealing that bias.

Of course, Jay Carney (Senior Vice President for Global Corporate Affairs at Amazon) has an obvious bias as well.

It's not clear whom to believe in this particular case---but biases and track records of fraud _are_ generally relevant context.

<comment><USER13> I'd like to to address a somewhat unfairly flagged sibling comment by russelluresti, on the topic of the _ad hominem_ fallacy.

Disbelieving someone because of a bias or a past dishonesty isn't the _ad hominem_ fallacy at all.

 _Ad hominem_ refers to a declaration that an argument is right or wrong based on the identity or attributes of the person making the argument, rather than its content, and relevant references.

The _disbelief_ in a report based on the nature of its source isn't a _declaration_ that it is false. It is rationally justified prudence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's actually weird to see a company firing back this publicly, releasing performance data (no matter if positive or negative) on previous employees, and it all being posted not by the CEO or a HR VP, but by the head of PR.

[Edit: Not only it smells of whitewashing, but it also looks deceptive.

And PR? Seriously? Not only it's a sleazy piece, but Amazon chose the worst possible position to convey the message. Get some engineer, accountant, designer, heck, get the HR intern who just joined 2 weeks ago to talk about this.

It would have more credibility than a PR person who's been in the company for less than one year.]

<comment><USER15> Why shouldn't it be the PR person? Someone at the level of Jay Carney is ostensibly more than just a mouthpiece, but someone who gathers the information and weighs in on what's useful and relevant to disseminate to the press. This isn't always a nefarious thing; sometimes employees have incomplete information but aren't in a position to confirm it with the executives.

At this phase, where the story has run and the damage has been done -- the response _should_ be done by Carney. Take the rebuttal to Mr. Olson, for example. That revelation is absolutely not something that should be revealed by Mr. Olson's boss or a coworker. First of all, just because you're an engineer doesn't mean you have all of the facts. The PR person is in a position to collect the facts, including whether or not it's legal to reveal Mr. Olson's reason for termination, and confirming that reason for termination with HR. Even Mr. Olson's boss wouldn't have that same level of confirmation.

The other advantage of having Carney make this response is that you can be sure that this is, for better or worse, the official company response. If instead, this was a blog post by Mr. Olson's co-worker calling him out for being a fraud...and the reaction to it was negative...then Amazon could pedal back and say, "Oh well that co-worker blogged something he shouldn't have and now he is being punished".

But since the condemnation of Mr. Olson has come straight from Mr. Carney, any backlash will be rightly the reaping of what Bezos, Carney, and all their lawyers have sowed.

edit: FWIW, a non-anonymous redditor is saying that he knows Bo Olson, personally, and says "I can assure you that Bo was not the one defrauding vendors that was another employee in the same department"...it strikes me as improbable that Carney (again, not just Carney, but Amazon's lawyers and HR) would get this wrong. But if they did...it's going to be a great backlash, and a much more lasting one than had this allegation come from someone other than Carney or Bezos himself.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/3pcnlh/what_the_n...](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/3pcnlh/what_the_new_york_times_didnt_tell_you/cw585to)

<comment><USER16> I think a lot of people's problem with this is that it's not very transparent.

You don't find out who Carney is until the very bottom of the article, and it's presented as just another journalistic article published by Medium and not an official rebuttal by the company.

If the whole thing was prefixed with "Following is Amazon's official rebuttal to the _New York Times_ article", I don't think many people would have a problem with it.

<comment><USER17> What's a "journalist article"? Medium is a blog host, not a newspaper. Medium is just paste.org with a better UI.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The NYT editor in chief has responded via Medium:

[https://medium.com/@NYTimesComm/dean-baquet-responds-to- jay-...](https://medium.com/@NYTimesComm/dean-baquet-responds-to-jay-carney-s- medium-post-6af794c7a7c6)

> _In response to your posting on Medium this morning, I want to reiterate my > support for our story about Amazon's culture. In your posting — as well as > in a series of recent email exchanges with me — you contested the article's > assertion that many employees found Amazon a tough place to work._

Specifically, he says had they known Olson had a conflict, they would have disclosed it. But the NYT asserts that Mr. Olson never disclosed such allegations, nor does he admit to them now.

> _Olson described conflict and turmoil in his group and a revolving series of > bosses, and acknowledged that he didn't last there. He disputes Amazon's > account of his departure, though. He told us today that his division was > overwhelmed and had difficulty meeting its marketing commitments to > publishers; he said he and others in the division could not keep up. But he > said he was never confronted with allegations of personally fraudulent > conduct or falsifying records, nor did he admit to that. If there were > criminal charges against him, or some formal accusation of wrongdoing, we > would certainly consider that. If we had known his status was contested, we > would have said so._

edit: re-reading Carney's statement, it seems pretty unequivocal: _" An investigation revealed [Olson] had attempted to defraud vendors and conceal it by falsifying business records. When confronted with the evidence, he admitted it and resigned immediately"_ The NYT is likewise unequivocal: _" [Olson] said he was never confronted with allegations of personally fraudulent conduct or falsifying records"_

Well, only Amazon has the time-stamped records that could prove who is lying here. It was a questionable tactic for Carney to start his response with such a bold and salacious allegation against someone who constituted a single quote in the NYT's story...assuming that Carney is right (because it's a complete unmitigated disaster if he isn't) now it seems he's going to have to go even more salacious, perhaps even post the actual pertinent records online.

How was this mudfest good for Amazon's image, again? And so late after the original story and Bezos's (pretty decent) response?

<comment><USER18> _Grabs popcorn_.

Olson is clinging to a lie, trying to defend his reputation.

Notice how he tries to blame Amazon for his departure, the "revolving series of bosses" and "overwhelmed" with work. "He and others couldn't keep up". Deflection.

He's doing his best to construct a version of events where he is one of the innocents, caught up in the nasty Amazon shit-storm.

I bet he got a shock to see Amazon reveal his fraudulent activity in a medium post! You think Amazon would make such a claim if it weren't true?

Nobody wants to see personal information released like this, but Amazon were slapped in the face with that NYT piece. Let 'em have their medium return fire.

Fraudsters and liars stick to their guns till the bitter end and beyond. It's best to weed them out, and have karma deliver what is deserved.

<comment><USER19> >I bet he got a shock to see Amazon reveal his fraudulent activity in a medium post! You think Amazon would make such a claim if it weren't true?

So your stance is "it must be true, because it would be really stupid of them if it wasen't?"

I think its equally valid to say they are acting stupidly, and counting on dollars and cents to keep any trouble off their door.

The truth is, they have just claimed the above. They pressed no charges, and have provided no documentation to sustain it. Right now, they have no more proof then him, and have a strong reason (redeeming their reputation though mudslinging) to say that he was a bad man, so his opinion doesn't matter. Of course,as the NYT responds, they interviewed way more people than just the ones Amazon cherry picked to respond too, and those people all disagree with the new Amazon spin.

<comment><USER18> I'm pretty sure a lot of companies would choose to deal with these sorts of internal matters without involving the law.

When the NYT times story came out I remember thinking it sounded a bit spinny. "Let's find an angle" is symptomatic of a desperate click-baity news media industry. NYT isn't as guilty of this as other outlets by a large margin, but the story had what I perceived as fabricated bite.

At the time, I wondered if any Amazon employees would come out defending their employer. Took me 5 seconds to find something... [https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2015/08/16/Working-a...](https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2015/08/16/Working- at-Amazon)

Are there others? Who knows, I don't care enough to search!

I'm not interested to take sides, but in big companies it's more likely there's pockets of problems, rather than company-wide problems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> > Here's what the story didn't tell you about Mr. Olson: his brief tenure at > Amazon ended after an investigation revealed he had attempted to defraud > vendors and conceal it by falsifying business records. When confronted with > the evidence, he admitted it and resigned immediately.

Together with the inappropriate disclosure of performance reviews, this statement just makes me think that Amazon probably has a culture of defrauding vendors, and usually gets away with it, but sometimes has to blame a junior hire to save face when caught.

<comment><USER21> Let's assume both Amazon and Carney are evil. Do you think it was acceptable for the Times to not disclose the context of Olson's dismissal?

<comment><USER22> NYT disputes it, see one of the comments above: > Olson described conflict and turmoil in his group and a revolving series of bosses, and acknowledged that he didn't last there. He disputes Amazon's account of his departure, though. He told us today that his division was overwhelmed and had difficulty meeting its marketing commitments to publishers; he said he and others in the division could not keep up. But he said he was never confronted with allegations of personally fraudulent conduct or falsifying records, nor did he admit to that. If there were criminal charges against him, or some formal accusation of wrongdoing, we would certainly consider that. If we had known his status was contested, we would have said so.

<comment><USER21> Thanks for the pointer. Here's the comment you refer to:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10414033](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10414033)

As danso notes, the NY Times editor and Amazon's Carney have now made pretty unequivocal contradictory statements, with little room for them both to be right without one of them outright lying. (And I don't think either one would go on the record here with an outright lie.) _Except_ that the NY Times says "But he [Olson] said he was never confronted with allegations of personally fraudulent conduct or falsifying records, nor did he admit to that... If we had known his status was contested, we would have said so". That is, they can both be telling the truth if _Olson_ was lying to the Times about his departure.

That's my prediction for how this shakes out. And in that case, the Times will have egg on their face for having not properly vetted their sources.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Anyone else remember that sly piece by BusinessInsider in September, saying that Medium could make a lot of money by becoming the modern-day version of PR Newswire -- where companies pay to get their stories out to the public? It sounded like a nutty comparison at the time.

But after looking at Jay Carney's post, I'm thinking that that BI's Biz Carson might have nailed it. Even if the premium pay channel doesn't exist yet ... the temptation to create it is clearly there

[http://www.businessinsider.com/medium-pr-newswire- revisited-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/medium-pr-newswire- revisited-2015-9)

<comment><USER24> You bring up a really good point. Medium's default layout scheme highlights content over authorship, so you don't get smacked in the face by the fact that this is written by Jay Carney.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Even in job interviews, Amazon touts itself is an intense, high-energy place to work, and that was exactly what I saw in the NYT article. Some people can't handle that, and they were fired or left disgruntled. The fact that many of the quotes were from disgruntled workers was completely obvious, and going into the dirty details of their firings is pretty low.

The most damning claim of the NYT article that isn't addressed here is the lack of caring and support for people on parental leave, FMLA, and people going through major health issues (cancer, stillborn child). If the authors embellished on those claims then that would actually hurt the original article.

</comment><comment><USER26> This seems to be the story that never ends... But everytime Amazon tries to respond it seems to dig itself deeper in its own bullshit (I'm a very loyal Amazon customer, and while I wouldn't work at Amazon in a million years, I'm very sorry to see all this).

Some comments:

> _Chris Brucia, who recalls how he was berated in his performance review > before being promoted, also was given a written review. Had the Times asked > about this, we would have shared what it said._

Amazon is willing to "share" with the press the contents of performance reviews of its employees? That's bad (worse than what was in the article).

> _Dina Vaccari, the former employee who is quoted saying she didn't sleep for > four days straight to illustrate just how hard Amazon forces people to work, > posted her own response to the article. Here's what she said:_ "Allow me to > be clear: The hours I put in at Amazon were my choice."

That's ridiculous and meaningless; if you choose to not sleep for 4 days in order to carry out your job, isn't it obvious the expectations were set too high, and work/life balance is regarded as irrelevant, as a company policy (or lack thereof)?

> _When there are two sides of a story, a reader deserves to know them both._

Well, ok (in general; sometimes there's no "other side"; creationism is not "another side" to the story of evolution, for example). But in this case, the "other side" should be Amazon employees doing normal hours and performing spectacularly, not the voice of management -- as rendered by someone who used to be the Mother of All Spin Doctors!

> _The next time you see a sensationalistic quote in the Times (...) you might > wonder whether there's a crucial piece of context or backstory missing — > like admission of fraud_

That's a cheap, defensive shot; what it really says is you're hurt; and that you'd probably be less hurt if there was not a lot of truth to the original article.

</comment><comment><USER27> Interesting note: the hiring of Jay Carney (Feb 26, 2015) coincides exactly with this article ("We were in regular communication with Ms. Kantor from February through the publication date in mid-August"). I wonder if such a high-visibility PR hire came about /because/ of this article?

<comment><USER28> I'm sure it would have been a multi-month process to hire for a position like Carney's so it likely would have started well before that February date.

<comment><USER29> Interesting speculation by the original commenter, however, as we can imagine that the NYT likely shopped the idea for the article to Amazon long before Ms. Kantor was originally in contact with Amazon. So perhaps the timeline went NYT shops idea for article with Amazon -> Amazon realizes they need a head of PR and starts looking -> Ms. Kantor reaches out to begin discussions with Amazon right around the same time Carney is hired

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> One can like or hate Amazon, and it may or may not be a crappy place to work.

That said, it sounds like NYT (a newspaper of record, btw) did more than reasonable selective reporting, to evoke certain feelings in the readers, to get clicks, to start a conversation, or what the reason may be. And it's lousy to see this in modern news reporting. Even the respectable publications err on the side of sensationalism, and it's notoriously hard to get unbiased information as a reader.

Where can someone go to read unbiased, well-researched, both-sides-of-the- story news?

<comment><USER31> "Where can someone go to read unbiased, well-researched, both-sides-of-the story news?"

I personally think we're spoilt for choice. Just bear in mind everyone, everywhere has an inherent bias. Some more so that others.

I read these to get what I feel is a well rounded opinion [http://america.aljazeera.com/](http://america.aljazeera.com/) [http://www.bbc.com/news](http://www.bbc.com/news)

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> If you worked for Amazon and you saw that Jay Carney was willing to reveal your personnel records if you talk to the media about unethical or illegal labor management practices, would it change your decision about speaking to reporters?

I think we should consider the possibility that this post will be more effective at intimidating current and former Amazon employees into silence, rather than persuading NYT readers.

<comment> rm_-rf_slash After having read down half the page of responses, your comment was enough to convince me to finally cancel my Prime membership.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> What a bizarre, at times completely inappropriate article to have posted. All it does is leave me amazed at - and a little embarrassed for - Amazon's PR department.

<comment><USER34> I'm basically an Amazon fanboy, but with the failure of the Fire phone, the continually over-wrought nature of AWS UI, and now this hamfisted response to the NYT, they are really losing their appeal.

Amazon: Your current employees had already written much better responses than this within 48 hours of the NYT article coming out. What is this drivel supposed to accomplish? Why is PR rant hosted on Medium? Why are you exposing old employee personnel records? Why are you putting political operatives like Carney in charge of your PR?

Get it together guys. The NYT article is ancient history now and didn't merit further response. It was an obvious hit piece but your reaction has been quite poor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> If anything, such a cynical and mean-spirited "reply" makes it absolutely and positively certain that working at Amazon should be the last thing any half- way competent Tech person should consider.

This piece reads exactly like an oppo-research piece that you would use as a hatchet-job on a political opponent. I had to check twice to ensure that this was not some kind of satire (it is getting harder for me to tell these days). It goes into great detail making personal attacks against the "complainers" while doing nothing to address the substantive allegations made by the articles.

So 1) yes there is a "snitch" tool that amazon encourages employees to use 2) the people identified have all quit after complaining of excessive work one way or another 3) when the initial story came out Almighty Leader Jeff even wrote a memo "please be more considerate" 4) PR flunky now makes sleazy attacks on ex-employees to blunt the negative perceptions.

Updated to add- You want an unsubstantiated ad-hominem here you go: "Jay Carney was encouraged to quit his white-house posting because of his incompetence. Also how seriously can you take a PR guy with the last name of 'Carney'? He had to go!"

</comment><comment><USER28> Did I miss out on some additional fallout after the article was initially published? I don't see why they're addressing this two months later.

<comment><USER36> My $.02: maybe they are starting to feel the fallout in their recruiting efforts about now. I get about one recruiting email from Amazon a month on average, and I assume others do as well. It's enough that 10% of candidates reply with "I wouldn't feel comfortable working there", or " I don't think it's a culture fit - I don't like crying at my desk, as is apparently encouraged over there" for them to realize they have to do something drastic. Sadly, for them drastic means going double-douche: outing ex-employees and attacking the media, rather than own up to even a small part of what was published, and say they are striving to improve their culture.

<comment><USER37> I read somewhere else that they are afraid of another upcoming expose, like from 60 minutes, and want to get out in front of it.

Even if that is true it was a really ham handed way of doing it. The only people this appeals to are ones that already like Amazon. The ones on the fence look at it and see "hey they drug out why this was a bad person" and think that they don't want to be on the receiving end of that and thus turn into ones that aren't inclined to work for them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I was pretty shocked by how over-the-top and lacking in context the Times piece was. Lots of industries have pretty intense work cultures (management consulting, medicine, wall street). The focus on Amazon and the exaggerated language made the piece seem very agenda-driven (EVERYONE cries at their desk? really?)

</comment><comment><USER39> Goes back at least as far as the 1980's, remember the Pulitzer Prize the Washington Post had to give up after one of their reporters literally made up a story about an 8 year old heroin addict.

Just because it's in a major newspaper, don't believe reporting is evenly balanced or without an agenda.

<comment><USER40> The piece was also in line with numerous previous reports on Amazon's working conditions for both blue collar and white collar employees.

<comment><USER17> That's a classic fallacy: You already had evidence, fine, but you don't get to re-use it to increase your confidence again later. If you want to build up a case, you need more evidence, need more narrative exaggeration backed by the old evidence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> If you're hiring in tech right now, you have to REALLY love Amazon for doing this. Basically, what they are saying is, if you speak out about the emotional hell of working for them, they will attempt to publicly humiliate you to make themselves look better.

You're going to go through hell working for them, and you're going to go through hell if you speak out after you leave. Now, they might think this is a winning strategy for them, but in fact the logical conclusion for potential hires is -- stay away from Amazon, because you'll hate it, and then they will ruin your reputation if you speak out. Which is really helpful for everyone else who's hiring right now, because intelligent people paranoid about their reputation will steer clear of any potential Amazon interviews.

Their PR guy doesn't understand that he just cost his employer an entire generation of talented engineers. Oh well, this is great for everyone else.

</comment><comment><USER42> Did I miss anything below (for anyone who wants to review)? The negative articles draw many more comments, but the general sentiment is not directed only against Amazon.

 _Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace_

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10065243](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10065243) (424 comments)

 _Inside Amazon_

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10070115](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10070115) (98 comments)

 _Amazon boss Jeff Bezos defends company 's workplace culture_

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072389](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072389) (73 comments)

 _My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon_

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10083475](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10083475) (331 comments)

</comment><comment><USER43> Someone walks to me and says things like this(the original NYTimes article) about say...Facebook, I will double check. If someone says what they said about Amazon, I won't double check (I know, I should). But you know what, I have heard so many anecdotes from people who have no reason to lie, that for me personally at this point, I have much better things to do than double check the obvious. Someone with a fancy university grant will do that, I have other stuff to do, like ignore all those amazon high-volume-recruiter incessant emails.

</comment><comment><USER44> It is sad that the NYT editorial standards are so weak, and they have cried wolf so many times (e.g. Apple suppliers' working conditions). They used to be a broadsheet with an opinion; now I don't know what they are :-(

</comment><comment><USER45> This reminds me so much of the Foxconn "scandal" that was "broken" on This American Life a few years ago. The source infiltrated Foxconn to expose human rights atrocities and abuse, but it turned out the source was lying about almost everything he told TAL.

</comment><comment><USER46> "Senior Vice President for Global Corporate Affairs at Amazon. Previously, he served as White House Press Secretary and spent 20 years as a reporter for TIME."

A spin doctor doing his best to protect the people that pay him. Pay this article no mind; unrelated assaults on a source's character have no bearing on already established facts.

<comment><USER47> Do you know the meaning of the word "hypocrisy"? Your comment almost had me laugh out loud.

<comment><USER46> Consider that the source I was mentioning had no positive gain associated with going to bat against Amazon in the original NYT story, and Jay Carney, as PR- guy, has a huge incentive (keeping his job) to go to bat for Amazon.

<comment><USER48> You don't think it's possible the former employee had an agenda or axe to grind after his dismissal?

People often act out when they are emotionally upset, which the former Amazon employee clearly was.

This whole HN thread is kind of amazing -- it's filled with ad hominem attacks against Carney because of his history in politics _.

Very few of the articles actually addressed Carney's main idea: the primary source from the NYT had a possible agenda/bias. The NYT reporters knew that, but did not report it. They also misled the Amazon people about their objective, pitching it differently and hiding facts that would have undercut their point.

It seems like Carney presented a lot of facts. If you dispute the facts in the article, or think Carney flat-out made up the email he quotes at length (or the reason for dismissal), then you are at least addressing the content of what he says.

_ granted, i have no idea what his political history is, as I'd never heard his name before.

<comment><USER46> Carney's history in politics is that of a mouthpiece whose purpose was to propagandize the media and thus the public. Should we even bother to read anything he says?

I say no, we should not pollute our minds with propaganda in general, nor Mr. Carney's latest medley of trying to shift the conversation away from Amazon's shitty culture.

The verdict is supported in this very thread: Amazon employees and former Amazon employees are coming out of the woodwork to refute Mr. Carney's whitewashing and support the original NYT article alleging that Amazon is an awful place to work. The dispute is settled.

We already know beyond a shadow of a doubt Carney will say whatever he's paid to, and that Amazon is a bad place to work... I'm not sure what's left to argue over.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Just weighing in on the Olson thing: Why is it considered unprofessional or inappropriate for a company rep to speak openly about the illegal/unethical practices of now former employees? Isn't that a good thing to hear about that a company you do business with is culling the ranks of those stealing from it, or whatever they happen to be doing?

If he admitted it and resigned over it, sounds like a pretty cut and dried case that he did it. Screw his reputation, and screw him. Maybe if this stuff was made public more often so that misbehaving executives got more punishment than a tiny ass fine and a huge sum of money, we'd have less of a crony- capitalist system going on these days.

<comment><USER36> Please look at the bigger picture: this is Amazon telling it's current (and future?) employees: if you ever say anything bad about us, all your records will go public, and our head of PR will use any inconsideration in them to argue that your opinion is invalid.

Fraud may have been the outlier case here: he's also outing reviews of other people whose opinions he/his employers don't like. That's one way to deal with whistle blowers, and scare the rest of the herd: don't mess with us - we've got your files, and we ain't afraid to put them on Medium.

<comment><USER49> Two things:

\- I have zero problem with a company releasing info pertaining the character of an employee.

\- If you're an employee doing your job honestly, you shouldn't either.

<comment><USER50> Who needs privacy when you have nothing to hide?

<comment><USER51> Should privacy really cover what someone else (in this case Amazon) thinks about you? These aren't medical records or other protected information.

<comment><USER36> Several points on this privacy angle:

1\. Many of the facts in your HR files are based on heresay - what your colleagues/managers/HR personnel think about you. These are highly subjective facts, very domain and company specific. Airing those out without context is a breach of privacy and can cause great damage to the employee down the line.

2\. These files belong to the employer - he can alter them to show whatever he wants them to; either in real time, or after the fact, to justify wrongful termination etc. I've actually seen that happen, when a pregnant colleague of mine was let go, and the management later invented a non-existent reason (right before they settled out of court).

3\. Privacy here goes one way: if you, the ex-employee, decide to protect your good name, or retaliate - maybe by discussing what you think really happened, you may be violating the NDA you signed. At worst, you could be sued for libel. Most of the time you have no facts on your side, and you can refer to #2 to see what happens to the facts aligned against you.

Finally, imho, if your employee was caught in the process of criminal activity, report him to the appropriate authorities and fire him. Letting him go quietly, only to use this fact against him later, smells of shoddy behavior to your current and past employees, and to your customers.

<comment><USER49> 1\. I agree, kind of. The documents if released publicly should be made available in whole so context can be seen.

2\. This pushes into the conspiracy area though, you'd have to have an entire chain of staff (at least in a company the size of Amazon) that couldn't _not_ know this had occurred, and somehow convince them all to be silent. Not impossible, just unlikely.

3\. If the company is releasing info about whatever occurred, an NDA would no longer apply. Why would it? The information is now public knowledge.

This I definitely agree with, when employees are found to be stealing it should be handled like any other matter; call the cops and let the process handle itself. Again I think we'd have a much less corrupt corporate culture in our society if we started treating these criminals like criminals.

<comment><USER36> 1\. Not really possible: context potentially includes specific projects, specific privileged technology, customer information, not to mention private data of other people. Take for example the following: I use the reporting system to say that an employee is doing a horrible job on project X, using technology Y, therefore causing us to give customer Z a discount. Would you now reveal X, Y, Z, my name, my review, the entire project's status at the time of the review, and few other things that might cause the company many issues down the line? Or will you just say: "his colleagues reported he was lazy and disruptive, not a team player, not a good developer etc."?

2\. Not far fetched at all, as I said, I saw it happen more than once. Usually we're discussing just the direct manager and one HR "specialist". I can put whatever I want in your file, whenever I want it. If it ever reaches a court, lawyers may discuss the what, why and when. But as someone else here mentions, people rarely sue their employers, so 99% of the time I can feel completely secure in retconning reality to fit my narrative.

3\. Nope. Read through NDAs signed in big companies - they are very one-sided. Unless a court specifically negates an NDA, you may still be charged for violating it. Take again the case in point 1. Suppose said employee responds back to the leak about him being lazy by saying: "our project for customer Z was already behind schedule, due to us switching mid project from Java to Scala" \- you just revealed privileged information: name of customer, status of project, technologies used. You may be sued for those. If customer Z decides to cancel their contract as a result of the leak, I'm sure the legal department of the former employer would be glad to talk to the employee about incurred damages.

Finally, remember that this is an uneven fight to begin with: ex-employees are usually in a vulnerable position (sometimes even financially), seeking their next job, and with no readily-available legal resources. Employers have legal departments, lawyers on retainer, and significant funds and time to tie you in court. That's why 99.9% of people keep below the radar even when they feel slighted.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> This is written by Jay Carney. Yes, that Jay Carney. Apparently he's working for Amazon now.

Two months after Bezos' internal memo is "leaked" to the press saying that the Amazon in the NYT peice isn't the Amazon he knows, and that employees should email him directly if something like that happens. Now it's time for the offensive. Apparently two months is the amount of time you no longer have to pretend to care about work conditions, and go back to reputation.

This medium piece attacks the character of the NYT's source, which is comedy gold coming from someone who was paid to be a lying weaselly bastard, performing active disservice to the citizenry.

<comment><USER28> Former Minister of Propaganda aside, if his account of one of the key sources of the story is true, it kinda affects how it should be perceived, right?

<comment><USER53> Right. How do we properly discern between professional bullshitters?

<comment><USER28> I would probably have to side with Amazon's account since it would be pretty easy for the person who resigned to sue for libel if it were not true. Don't think Amazon would want to expose themselves like that.

<comment><USER54> I would likely be millions of dollars richer if I happened to record a two minute conversation with my former boss's boss, who was an ecclesiastical leader at a church that I eventually left. He told me point blank that the reason I was fired was because I wasn't faithful enough and was no longer worthy of my (completely unrelated) employment. On the books, however, they made it out to be a performance issue. I had plenty of witnesses available to me that could have proven that it wasn't a performance issue, but in an at- will company, that doesn't get me anything at all.

I don't go around recording random conversations, and corporations have a lot of ways to cover their tracks. When that is your reality and the burden of proof is on you, you don't do anything. You get fucked and you learn from it.

<comment><USER28> You're approaching it from the employee perspective rather than the employer's. Given that Amazon put this out to repair their image, do you think they would risk a headline (even if eventually proven to be false) that says "Amazon lied about employee's resignation"? This guy could absolutely get someone to take a case pro bono with all the press it's getting.

<comment><USER54> I'll give you two hypothetical situations:

1) Vendor manager Jim tries to defraud a vendor. He gets caught, and confronted about it. He realizes he messed up, accepts responsibility, and resigns on the spot.

2) Vendor manager Joe gets pressured by boss to defraud a vendor because the boss is under pressure from his boss to cut costs or be fired. Joe pushes back, gets reprimanded for not following Amazon's "disagree and commit" principle, and gets a poor performance review. Joe learns his lesson, defrauds his vendors, and everything is fine. The boss's boss and boss leave eventually because they never could get costs down, and the newly re-orged boss notices some discrepancies. Joe gets blamed for defrauding customers, and is told that he is now violating Amazon's "Insist on the Highest Standards" leadership principle. Joe immediately quits out of frustration with Amazon's leadership and culture.

Here is the problem: Both scenarios have the same paper trail of a fraud allegation and immediate resignation. And that paper trail is enough security to defend a position in court...especially if it is the employee's burden of proof to show what really happened.

<comment><USER28> RE: #2, agree that this absolutely happens just seems implausible in this situation. For argument's sake, let's assume this happens but it's not widespread at Amazon. I have not read any former employee accounts of it and the NYT would have ABSOLUTELY published something even if they had a whiff of it. Under that assumption, this guy happens to be one of the few people quoted by name in the article that happened to have undergone something shady at work? I don't know why he put his name out there if what Amazon claims is true and I definitely don't know why he would have put his name out there if your second hypothetical is remotely true. Just doesn't make sense.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> "Here's what the story didn't tell you about Mr. Olson: his brief tenure at Amazon ended after an investigation revealed he had attempted to defraud vendors and conceal it by falsifying business records. When confronted with the evidence, he admitted it and resigned immediately."

It doesn't matter. If the devil tells the truth, it's still the truth.

<comment><USER56> But if it's the devil talking, you have fair grounds for increasing your suspicion that what's said isn't the truth.

And in this case, if Mr. Olsen did in fact get caught by such an investigation, he may be significantly biased against Amazon. That does not automatically make what he says untrue, but it does increase suspicion that it may not be the straight story.

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> While Mediums (Jay Carney's) article has a fair point, in that once you look at article under a microscope its conclusions start to fall apart, I think Jay may have missed _what_ the article is. The authors knew from the get-go that they were going to publish a scathing "insider", "never-before seen" review of Amazon. The NYT article is First-Class clickbait. It's Buzzfeed in a suit with a degree.

Jay Carney did an excellent job debunking it; however, it's much like debunking a Buzzfeed article. You might come out ahead logically, but that isn't what people are going to be talking about. The NYT isn't going for truth, they need people to read their newspaper, and then talk about it so they decided to write a bad article about Amazon, and then they found the "sources" for it.

</comment><comment><USER58> The similarities and inaccuracies remind me of the Rolling Stone "A Rape on Campus" story. What is wrong with today's journalism? These are established, mainstream publishers. There is so much focus on the message instead of the facts that entire stories can be fabricated.

I canceled my NYTimes subscription last year because it has become increasingly frustrating to read, especially their "women in tech" articles. For example, their recent "What Really Keeps Women Out of Tech"[0] op-ed blames nerd male culture for making women uncomfortable, and argues for a more neutral environment with no Star Wars posters or tech magazines or nerdy t-shirts...

[0] [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/11/opinion/sunday/what- really...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/11/opinion/sunday/what-really-keeps- women-out-of-tech.html?_r=0)

</comment><comment><USER59> Acting like Scientology.

</comment><comment><USER60> Here are some more people for Jay to slander:

[http://qz.com/482080/dear-jeff-bezos-i-wish-you-had-asked- fo...](http://qz.com/482080/dear-jeff-bezos-i-wish-you-had-asked-for-my- feedback-sooner/)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10123456](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10123456) ( [https://medium.com/@jcheiffetz/i-had-a-baby-and-cancer- when-...](https://medium.com/@jcheiffetz/i-had-a-baby-and-cancer-when-i- worked-at-amazon-this-is-my-story-9eba5eef2976) )

</comment><comment><USER61> Disclaimer: I am a former Amazon employee. I worked there for exactly a year. I assume I was doing well, I was offered increase bonus and base after my initial year.

This response from Amazon continues to amaze me - first a post from Bezos that quoted an employee's anecdotal experiences and makes the (totally absurd) claim that Bezos doesn't know what life is like working there.

Then they have a post ([http://recode.net/2015/09/25/why-i-work-for-amazon-a- respons...](http://recode.net/2015/09/25/why-i-work-for-amazon-a-response/)) from a Senior VP who doesn't have the same experience as someone who isn't a Senior VP.

Now they are digging up dirt on employees to paint them with a bad brush. First, the person with the killer quote should have been removed, no question. Huge bias.

But the second and third people? Nothing in the piece is wrong - they could have been strafed with aggressive language and/or they could have been berated in their reviews. Look at the wording:

      All three included positive feedback on strengths as well as thoughts on areas of improvement.
      Far from a "strafing," even the areas for improvement written by her colleagues contained
      language like: "It has been a pleasure working with Elizabeth."

This is the best you can do? "Contained language like"? This is truly terrible spin. At Amazon, they teach managers to give the classic "shit sandwich" \- good/bad/good. I saw many examples (I was a manager and reviewed many pieces of feedback in OLRs - Organizational Leadership Review) written EXACTLY as ham-handedly as this: "Overall, it has been a pleasure working with Elizabeth. However, the fact that she did not know the margins for a specific warehouse group when presenting to our VP shows a complete lack of diving deep, and makes me question whether or not she really wants to work at this level."

The third example is similarly vague/wrong: "Chris Brucia, who recalls how he was berated in his performance review before being promoted, also was given a written review... Mr. Brucia was given exceptionally high ratings and then promoted to a senior position." That doesn't mean he wasn't berated - it could have been overly aggressive/wrong (and you cannot dispute ANY claims written in the feedback, all you can do is complain to your manager), just because it ended on a good note doesn't make it less hurtful.

But what this really shows is that Amazon is as ruthless as ever. They WILL go after you, they will dig up dirt on you, and they will terrify you into never speaking out. If you are a former employee (as I am), you know the stories are very very true, and NEVER speak out publicly.

      When the story came out, we knew it misrepresented Amazon.

I'm sorry, Mr. Carney, the story was as accurate a representation of Amazon as I've ever seen in press.

<comment><USER10> I left a few months ago and I have mixed feelings about the company. I went through a period where I felt pretty depressed and hated it there, but it wasn't really anything in particular that amazon did. I actually had it pretty good. Things did start to go downhill really bad this year (on my team). The team culture became pretty toxic because of some organizational/ operational changes and management didn't seem to care. There was also pressure from above that I don't think my immediate manager handled well, and things were bad.

i don't think the article was entirely fair, but amazon has some deep flaws. There was a pastebin on reddit by a few that was much more accurate.

I do think in the right situation I would consider working there again. It really is a minefield though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> Just love that Bezos quote: "that's not the amazon that i know" ... hmm gee uthink? billionaire founder has a different experience, wow who'd a thought?

glassdoor has spelled this out for a long time but its amusing that amazon doesn't admit they'll change.

my thinking is: a company that relishes in frugality = your machine your monitors and your coffee will suck, you will never get promoted, stack rank Plus all this bs about suing via nda and indebtedness around relo assistance etc sounds like the suck .. amazon is downright hostile

</comment><comment><USER63> Saw a great post relating to this a few months ago.

[http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/using- data-...](http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/using-data-to- benchmark-amazon-engineering-employee-satisfaction)

At the very least the reporters could have checked Glassdoor and seen that employees actually rate Amazon fairly well.

</comment><comment><USER64> American journalism is like the American judiciary: the truth is irrelevant and whoever can produce the more convincing _story_ wins.

</comment><comment><USER65> It seems bizarre to me that this rebuttal took two months to publish. Are they seeing a problem with recruiting all of a sudden?

</comment><comment><USER66> Taking a high level approach here, there are a lot of details on both sides that could be disputed. But what remains true, is there is a reason this article was written about Amazon and not any of the many other tech companies out there. There is obviously an element of truth to the story, even if specific details can be disputed.

</comment><comment><USER67> "Give me six words of an innocent man, and I will find something in them with which to hang him"

How should companies interact with the press today in order to avoid an outcome like the original NYT article?

<comment><USER45> It's "six lines", not "six words". I think Cardinal Richelieu would be hard pressed to find six words to be as incriminating, unless they were, "I have just committed high treason".

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> For someone who had to stand at the White House podium for years, it's got to be gratifying to get a shot back at the media for once.

</comment><comment><USER10> > Also, [the anytime feedback tool is] not anonymous

I assume by this they mean managers can see who left feedback.

</comment><comment><USER69> The headline seems very click-baitish and uninformative. Can we be more specific? The New York Times doesn't tell me a lot of things.

 _Jay Carney Rebuts New York Times Article About Amazon 's Work Culture_, perhaps?

</comment><comment><USER70> How about some proof that Olson committed fraud. With everything I've been hearing about Amazon, I have to wonder if Olson was innocent or scapegoated by a group of people involved in the fraud.

</comment><comment><USER71> I'm pretty sure I know what the headline of this article didn't tell me. What it was about.

</comment><comment><USER72> > What The New York Times Didn't Tell You

Am I the only one tired of click-bait titles that don't tell you anything about the article? Had to read the comments here to understand what the article was about and decide if it was worth reading.

All it takes is 4 extra words to give the title context:

> What The New York Times Didn't Tell You [about working at Amazon]

<comment><USER73> We changed the title to add "about Amazon" and remove the linkbait "you".

<comment><USER72> Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> Ambigous title.

</comment><comment><USER75> Does this kind of behavior indicate we should stop using Amazon? Despite loving my Kindle, is it time to boycott a company that behaves this way?

<comment><USER9> No.

<comment><USER75> Excellent feedback.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER76> O wow, this makes Amazon look really bad - it's like when politicians opponents try to discredit opponents with criminal charges or whatnot without actually refuting them.

Note how they don't really deny or refute the text of original article but just go full on to personally attack a person to discredit him.

</comment><comment> rm_-rf_slash While selective storytelling has been a staple of traditional news media for ages, this article does tempt me to ask: why Amazon? Of all the workaholic culture tech companies of the last 20 years, why did the New York Times choose to center the exposé on Amazon.com?

My entirely baseless suspicion is that unlike many other tech companies, Amazon is a direct competitor in its ability to drive information to their customers through their proprietary devices and channels, and can also slowly chip away at the newspaper's clout with Amazon ratings for books displacing the Times' bestseller list, for example. Instead of reading Times' reviews of books, films, products, and so on, a customer might consider Amazon's 5-star review system to be enough for them.

Amazon's work culture is hardly unique in corporate America, especially among the tech industry. The New York Times knew that they would make an adversary with that piece. They chose their target carefully.

<comment><USER52> The motivation you speculate on seems, uh, awfully complicated compared to "Newspaper airs dirty laundry of Fortune 29 company."

<comment><USER77> Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post (edited: Not Amazon, but Bezos owns WP)</comment></comment></comment>


There Really Was a Liberal Media Bubble - <AUTHOR> https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/there-really-was-a-liberal-media-bubble/ <comment><USER2> "Diversity of opinion? For starters, American newsrooms are not very diverse along racial or gender lines, ..."

They're just categorically unable to see what's staring them right in the face, aren't they? Stop. Equating. Race. And. Gender. With. Diversity. Of. Opinion. It's. A. Non. Starter.

<comment><USER3> Diversity of experiences is important when looking for diversity of opinions. Most of America is either female or not caucasian so if all you are getting is white men I feel like that would indicate a large systematic bias in your sampling

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> So journalists are still going through the stages of grief after the last presidential election.

</comment><comment><USER5> In my opinion (and I disagreed with Nate in late October, and early November), Nate is great at trees, but horrible at forests.

For instance, he never took into account the high bias of the media. Tons of people saw it - I'd even argue that most Trump voters saw it.

But he never saw it, nor the effect that it had. I contended that the polls did not make sense - one candidate was pulling huge crowds and yet was hated by everyone? Didn't make sense to me.

But that's one opinion. I fault him for not saying, "hey, wait - the media is really biased in this - could their polls be too?"

That's what I thought. No, I didn't have the statistics horsepower available, but I saw the forest. So did many others.

One (much smarter than me to be sure), was Nicholas Taleb, who excoriated Nate on his lack of statistics knowledge. His critique was well above my understanding, but I'll trust someone who made money off of statistics more than any pollster.

<comment><USER6> I followed the election via Nate Silver's site and remained frightened of a Trump victory the whole time.

How does that square with all the people like yourself who have a different recall?

Quite a lot of it seems to come down to people just boiling everything he said to a binary Hillary will win message. Humans are after all famously terrible with stats. What does it mean for example to have disagreed with him in November? My only interpretation of that is that you thought Trump would win. But he never said Clinton would win, he's making a statistical prediction. It's like arguing he's wrong because a dice roll came up 2 and he only gave it 1/6th odds.

I can say for definite that he talked repeatedly about the possibility of the polls being wrong, specifically saying that if the polls were off by the same amount that they have historically been off and in his favor, then Trump would win. Again, I don't understand why people want to pretend he never said stuff like this. Is it part of their own media bias narrative?

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Nate, Nate" I said ever so many times, graciously telling my tale. You got it wrong. Horribly wrong. Let it go and move on. The US mainstream media is not there to report the news. It's there to shape public opinion in favor of the small group of elites who own it. It didn't work in 2016 because there's been an awakening; people want government that represents them and not itself and they're sick of being lied to. No-one really gives a fuck about what's on Memoerandom. This analysis reads like an in-depth textual criticism of the Hitler Diaries that's forgotten the main point about them: they weren't real.

Let me give you an example of how pathetic the reporting has become. This is an interview from Columbia Journalism Review ([http://www.cjr.org/q_and_a/washington_post_bezos_amazon_revo...](http://www.cjr.org/q_and_a/washington_post_bezos_amazon_revolution.php)):

CJR: So you think news consumers in the future will make a decision on which Hillary Clinton story to click on based on speed? If they see a number of options and their experience tells them that The Washington Post is faster, then they're going to read that one?

SP: Yes. And we see that already. I don't know if it's a conscious choice. I think it's more about not hesitating to click.

CJR: I can't imagine that's a popular view in the newsroom.

JM: Well, it doesn't really change our editorial strategy in any way.

I'm an old-school journo and I found a number of things in this disturbing. One: Hillary is assumed to be the winner. Two: The WaPo is admittedly trying to brainwash their readers through site responsiveness. Three: the article should mention owner Jeff Bezos's large contracts with the intelligence community and the ramifications of possible influence there. But it doesn't.

In short, it's propaganda.

<comment><USER8> Also this, from the interview:

"When Jeff bought us, within about six months, he threw (profitability) out. Now there are three other criteria. It's basically: How fast do you move? It's very subjective. The second one is that there are no sacred cows, to push experimentation. The third thing is debate, but commit. So you can argue all you want, but once we agree, then there's no undermining."

In other words, "we've chosen the narrative; don't you content producers DARE to go outside it."

<comment><USER7> Of course he threw profitability out. An alphabet, probably the CIA, has underwritten him for the foreseeable future. Jeff Bezos is what's known as a NOC, a Non-Official Career officer in the CIA. And they do as they're told. Other examples: Valerie Plame, Eric Schmidt, billg, Eric Braverman.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm not an American but as far as I can tell the Liberal bias is created by the media staying the same and the country moving to the right.

I don't really buy the idea that diversity of opinion is something to strive toward. Human opinion doesn't follow some sort of gaussian distribution, and there are opinions that are objectively objectionable.

</comment><comment><USER10> I actually think Silver deserves some of the blame because he set the odds at basically 20-25% that Trump could win.. Many people who would have "held their noses" and voted for Hillary did not, and Trump won.

<comment><USER11> _Silver deserves some of the blame_

That's not fair to Silver. At all.

You're really saying he was a reason that Hillary lost? He should have been nothing more than a cheerleader? Is there no longer a place for impartiality or objectivity in polling and reporting?

So hundreds of thousands of voters in Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania first checked to see what Silver was saying, then decided that the election was in the bag for Hillary, and then decided to vote for Trump as a protest?

The media groupthink was absurd. Compared to the rest of them, Silver was an outlier. For example, Huffington Post gave Hillary a 98.2% chance of winning, and predicted she would get 323 electoral votes.[1]

Blame HuffPost if you want to blame someone. Heaven forbid you actually blame the person most at fault: Hillary Rodham Clinton. Trump didn't win, Hillary lost, because she was a worse candidate than Trump, if such a thing was possible!!!

[1] [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/polls-hillary-clinton- wi...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/polls-hillary-clinton- win_us_5821074ce4b0e80b02cc2a94)</comment></comment>


Node.js Async/Await in ES7 - <AUTHOR> http://stackabuse.com/node-js-async-await-in-es7/ <comment><USER2> That first example could be greatly simplified with Promise.all..

async/await is nice and I will surely use it but if you know what you're doing the current state isn't really as bad as it is made out to be, in my opinion.</comment>


One Sure-Fire Way to Improve Your Coding - <AUTHOR> http://fuelyourcoding.com/one-sure-fire-way-to-improve-your-coding/ <comment><USER2> I don't recommend reading code for an exercise (at least not by itself). I _do_ recommend modifying code as an exercise though. There are lots of pieces of code that are deceptively complex: they look simple, but come to a grinding halt when you make the slightest change. Thus, it's important to know that there's a difference between what code is doing and what it _looks like_ it's doing.

This teaches a few things:

1\. How to read code

2\. How to write code

3\. How _not_ to write code. When you encounter the grinding halt effect I mentioned above, there's a good chance that's how not to write code (but maybe not, some code is naturally tricky).

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point. In the article I also point out that you should not be reading code passively. You should be running the tests, executing the code, breaking stuff, and trying to fix it.

<comment><USER2> I noticed that. Perhaps my point is more of a semantic one. It still seems to me that the article seems to focus more on the reading than the modifying though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Someone should make a site where user's share pieces of code and explain why it's awesome. Allow people to comment etc. I want to read more code, but don't have to time to go find it.

<comment><USER4> I started work on it straight after I read your comment... With some luck I should have a minimal version finished by this afternoon. I'll post a link here as a response!

<comment><USER5> I thought about doing this project in the past and I really wanted something on the opposite side of Daily WTF (the code, not the stories).

I remember reading about Quake's inverse square root ( [http://betterexplained.com/articles/understanding-quakes- fas...](http://betterexplained.com/articles/understanding-quakes-fast-inverse- square-root/) ) and how a website should be dedicated to beautiful code.

I've never got into thinking what features the site should or should not have, for example: comments? forum-like interface? code-wiki so people can improve the submission? user submitted code? editor reviewed, crowd votting? tags to classify code? tales of adoption in production?

<comment><USER4> So far I'v got threaded comments, rating of code and comments, flagging, GitHub integration and a very ugly layout :-p

The actual functional side of the code is almost done. I'll be starting work on graphic design/layout in the next hour or so.

I'd be interested to hear feature requests...

<comment><USER6> This will be a brilliant site if you can pull it off nicely, keep on it!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Completely agree. In fact one of the biggest problems our office has with new hires fresh out of college, many of which are really bright kids, is that they haven't read enough BIG pieces of code.

When working alone it might not matter but when working in a team of 50 coders on a million line code base that goes across 5 continents and 10 different hardware platforms... Being able to consume and understand large chunks of code and how they fit together is essential. Personally, for any young programmers I'd suggest you practice reading and understanding large software modules... example: some big, active, corner of the linux kernel. (I'm a C / C++ systems developer so I'm biased).

</comment><comment><USER8> These types of productivity articles have been an excuse for me to keep spending too much time on HN. The thing is, I already know most of what's in the articles, but I'm not doing such a great job of executing them. Freeing up time by spending less time on HN could help. So, perhaps finding these articles the way I do is a net productivity loss.

Of the articles I've read on the topic, though, I think this is a really good one. I like the point about seeing how something you really like is built. I think this must be how people get started with Cappuccino. It's weird, but it does some really neat things. The same could be said of Cassandra.

Edit: I just realized this comment reads like a Yelp review. It starts completely off topic, and gradually gets on topic. Please forgive me. :)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Read any good code lately? I'd love some recommendations.

<comment><USER7> For a mind boggling good time (If you can have that in C) take a look aftr.c. This is Comcast's open source ipv4 -> ipv6 routing code. I'm not saying it's pretty... but if your interest lay in C and systems level bit twiddling it's 13000 lines of good times.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I learned programming on the Apple ][+ by typing in programs and then modifying them. Nothing forces you to read the code better than being forced to type it in!

</comment><comment><USER10> Reading code on a computer can be tedious, and only a few relics like TeX are available in print. Fortunately, two recent innovations make reading recent code much more pleasant: Github and the iPad. Try it some time.

</comment><comment><USER11> This piece makes a similar argument with a helpful example:

[http://factore.ca/on-the-floor/29-going-to-the-source-of- ope...](http://factore.ca/on-the-floor/29-going-to-the-source-of-open-source)

</comment><comment><USER12> > First, note the file structure. This step is aided by an editor that has a > folder hierarchy view

<http://mama.indstate.edu/users/ice/tree/></comment>


Show HN: How to do private variables in JavaScript - <AUTHOR> https://gist.github.com/CodeOtter/4b2e048d7f70590fb2c2dcd837987f97 <comment><USER2> A slick solution. But I've given up on runtime guards in JS; life is just better with a type system.</comment>


Ask HN: Question about forming a company for side projects. - <AUTHOR> What I'm thinking about doing is forming a LLC to run some of my side projects under. I'd like to look into seeing if I can make money both with advertising and selling services with at least one of my projects.
I'm self funding right now, and working by myself. I'd rather do a simple LLC with a simple operating agreement and then if one my projects turns into something I'd want get investors for, or investors want to invest in, I'd form a new company and transfer the assets to it.
The LLC would be to protect personal liability, I'd even be looking into what the costs are for liability insurance. However, drafting up corporate documents and forming a class c in preparation for what the future may hold is something I'm not comfortable doing right now as I've never done it, and I don't think I can afford a lawyer right now to do it.
Is that a logical plan, or is there something I'm not thinking about that I should be? <comment><USER2> At this point, I've twice - not once but _twice_ formed corporate entities for projects that never got off the ground. I won't do that again unless I'm diving into a high liability field, or have ridiculously high assets that it's worth it from an EV perspective... your chance of getting sued selling basic advertising and contracting services are pretty low, and if you're contracting individually they'd sue you as an individual anyways even if they're not supposed to. This might protect your assets some if you lose, but you'd still be on the hook for legal fees to defend enough to protect yourself from personal liability.

My take - just get started. Form up an LLC once you get your first cash coming in. Ignore this if you have significantly high assets already. If not, this is probably being over-cautious, and the time and money is probably better spent elsewhere.

Edit: It's pretty trivial to assign intellectual property you own to a corporate you own too, if you ever want investors. If an investor wants you, not having an entity already won't slow you down. If anything, the wrong kind of entity is probably more of a hassle to transfer IP from and dissolve. Just get started.

<comment><USER3> But if you had formed a single entity for all your side projects, then it wouldn't have happened a second time (you wouldn't have to have formed 2 entities for projects that never got off the ground -- just one).

I think it's reasonable to start a single llc for your side projects, and to spin them off as needed. And is what I have done (and spun off 2 LLCs from the original).

The problem if you don't is that everything will get muddled in your personal finances and that's not a good thing. (I have no idea about the logistics if you want funding down the line, however)

<comment><USER4> By definition everything in a LLC is muddled in with your personal finances. That's why it's a "pass-thru entity". For tax purposes, they really are one and the same.

<comment><USER5> This is not true. A pass-through entity simply means that the LLC does not _pay_ taxes. It does however keep separate records and submits separate tax forms than you do personally.

It goes like this:

      LLC files form 1065
        Form 1065 includes income / expenses of the LLC
        Attached to form 1065 is a form K1 for each member
          Form K1 includes the (net profit/loss * member's % ownership) + guaranteed payments (like a salary)

      You file form 1040
        Attached to form 1040 is your copy of the K1, which gets treated as additional income
        You may also attach your personal business expenses [1]
        You pay taxes on this ammount

Your LLC then mails in the 1065 + K1s. Then you send in your 1040 + K1s + the taxes you owe personally.

So you see, LLCs file tax forms completely separately, it's only the check you have to write to the government that's "pass-through".

[1] Your personal business expenses are expenses that came out of your personal account for a business expense, so like a reimbursable expense. This gets reported on your personal taxes rather than the company's separate business expenses that came out of the company account. In general, just try not to do this if you can help it, as it just makes things more confusing.

<comment><USER6> Correct me if I am wrong, but a 1065 might be overkill for a one owner business (LLC or not). Yes you should report your LLC income separately on a 1065 & allocate profit/loss if there are multiple owners. However, if there is only one owner, it is IMO an extra unneeded step.

For a small business with one owner, a Schedule C (or C-EZ) attached to the 1040 will suffice. No need to send a 1065 to the IRS and then submit a K1; it is just a small business in the eyes of the IRS.

Keep it simple by keeping track/records of your business income and expenses and report it on the Sched C which attaches to your 1040.

Note: I am currently taking a corporate tax course & studying for the CPA exam. I prepared taxes as a VITA volunteer last year.

<comment><USER5> Yes, good catch, sorry I didn't clarify. So essentially, the 1065 + K1 has 2 main purposes as I understand it. 1) Report the business income / expenses, and 2) report the respective percentages that each member takes of the business's profit / loss (notice there is no (3) for the LLC actually paying taxes, this was my main point).

With a single-person LLC, it's even simpler, because there is no (2). This is why single-person LLCs can file a Schedule C as a simple attachment to their own taxes, which gets reported on personal taxes as other income, just like the K1 would. And Schedule C is still reporting all of the company's income / expenses separately than the individual's other financials, so there is still no "muddying up" between business and personal finances.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I am doing the same, but in Hong Kong its called a Limited Liability (Ltd) company.

My main reason is for subscribers that have recurring subscriptions through Paypal and where there is no way to transfer payments from "Joe Citizen" to "Joe's Company Ltd" if it takes off in the future.

Also, if you want to apply for a merchant account then you must be a Ltd company. Its about US$1000 to get a basic LTD company registered in HK.

</comment><comment><USER8> I've been using an LLC for my ad-supported websites' income, paid writing, and side consulting work for a few years.

I'm _far_ from a financial expert, so I could be wrong, but my impression is that it's been very beneficial in the finance department. You can purchase an awful lot of things with effectively pre-tax dollars if they are legitimate business expenses (like that new MBP); things that you may have normally purchased with post-tax funds anyway.

I haven't needed to invoke its liability protections, but I've been told (by counsel) that the most important thing is to keep your money well separated. If you intermingle your funds or use business funds for personal expenses, that can be used to pierce the corporate veil and nullify your protection.

<comment><USER9> I've been told that the rules are more flexible for LLC deductions than they are for sole proprieters (freelancers), especially when it comes to writing off parts of a home or equipment that is not 100% business use.

The advice I was given was: for a sole proprieter, you have to prove that a thing is used exclusively for a business; for a corporation, you have to prove only that a thing cannot be used exclusively for non-business reasons.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I setup an LLC for my side projects and consulting a couple years ago. Since then, it has evolved into my consultancy that I now do full-time (in fact, my latest creation, LeadNuke, is a "product of Alfa Jango, LLC", and may be spun off if I decide to take any investment for it).

Forming an LLC really is not very difficult, and it's good practice to get started early if you plan on going full-time at some point. More importantly, the clarity boundaries it provides to your business expenses and taxes is worth the effort alone.

Single-person LLCs are legit and can protect your personal liability IF you run it like a legit company. People who form single-person LLCs have a tendency to get lazy with record-keeping and procedures. Don't fall into this trap. If someone sues you, and the judge looks over your records and says, "Yeah, but you didn't do anything differently than if you hadn't formed an LLC," personal liability protection is gone. This means, setup a separate business bank account for ALL business income/expenses, sign ALL contracts with your business name, make sure clients address checks and issue your 1099s to your business name, etc.

Concerning insurance, I wouldn't bother unless you're working on a project that has the potential to lose a lot of money if you do something wrong. If you work on an ecommerce application for a company that will be doing $50k or more sales a month through it, perhaps insurance starts looking like a good idea (god forbid you accidentally leave their merchant account in test mode when you deploy, and no one catches it for a week).

If you do get insurance, what you actually want is called Errors and Omissions insurance (liability insurance is for if you have a physical office and you want to protect against your equipment if there's a fire, or if a client visits and slips and breaks their arm). If you get E&O insurance, be sure to shop around, many of the big insurance companies won't do it for you, because of how new and unknown the web-based software industry is, so you might have to go with a smaller local insurance company to work out some policy that fits your needs.

EDIT: I should clarify that in Michigan, forming an LLC is incredibly easy. I'm not sure about California, if that's where you are.

</comment><comment><USER10> I have been recommending to self-employed people here in the UK to set up a limited company if they can, as taxes on dividends in this country are much lower than those on pay.

If you reduce your salary to a small (but not unreasonable) amount and withdraw extra money form the company in dividends, is a legal and perfectly reasonable way of saving on your taxes. However I do not know if this strategy would provide any benefit in the US tax system. I guess it depends on the state you live in.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for all the replies. I think the consensus is that I'm on track. It's actually cheaper to register an LLC in Deleware than it is in my home state of VA, so I'll look at that.

I am aware that I will have to keep all the paperwork, hold an annual meeting (even if it is with myself) and everything else to make sure it's established as an entity.

Besides personal liability, finances are another issue. The main thing I want to do though is when I sign up for services like ad.ly, bing advertising and even Google adsense, all the money goes into an account other than my personal one. That way I can also track how much money I'm really bringing in. Using it for personal consulting would be very helpful as well. This also means I can transfer my domains to that entity as well. The separation of finances is something that I think will be very helpful. I'm currently on a 3 year plan I created to get rid of a lot of my own debt, so separating business finances will be helpful. Also, at this stage I'd like to make sure everything the projects make go back into project so that hopefully one of them does turn out to be a profitable venture.

</comment><comment><USER11> Unless you have some big assets that makes you personally worth suing or, frankly, you are doing something slightly dodgy that you want some separation from, then I would only form the company once you are making a few $1000 profit.

When you create the LLC you will have filing costs, anual LLC costs ($800/year for a CA LLC), accountants fees... You basically don't want to be paying those until you have income to offset them.

You mentioned forming a company to do several side project with the view that if one takes off it will be already set up for investment and growth... well don't forget that all of your other side projects will be in there too and so investors will own those ideas too. You might decide that if a given business/side project is worth having an entity then it's probably worth having its own entity in its own right.

</comment><comment><USER12> As far as taxes are concerned, I understand that a single-person LLC is really no different than a sole proprietorship. The income from the LLC is passed through on your taxes (LLC isn't recognized by the IRS) and taxed the same as extra income plus self-employment tax.

After doing research, I decided against forming an LLC for my side-business (software) since it's just me and I don't expect to have any liability issues.

It's much more important to form a legal entity when you have a partner that you need to split profits with. In this case, I'm leaning toward S-Corp as it allows a lot more flexibility than LLC and doesn't require that you pay self- employment tax on disbursements as long as you take a reasonable salary.

</comment><comment><USER13> From what I've been told, only plan on creating an LLC if you:

1\. Want to be able to write a bunch of stuff off as company expense.

2\. Don't mind the paperwork.

For liability you need insurance, not protection from an LLC or C-Corp, neither of which will necessarily protect your assets if you are working on your own.

The advantage of a C-Corp primarily is to get business from companies interested in corp-to-corp. If you look on Dice, etc. there are a number of jobs listed as corp-to-corp only. I read that this partially stems from a court decision where contractor employees were able to sue for benefits that weren't even W2, but that if you are under a C-Corp they wouldn't have to worry about that.

<comment><USER14> You can't write anything off unless you have income from that company coming in to offset against.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Let me know what you find out about the insurance. I've been curious about that.

</comment><comment><USER16> I would recommend spending some time reading "Inc. and Grow Rich!" (<http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001OXCERE/>). This book will help you decide whether incorporating is right in your situation; and, if it is, what type of corporation best fits your goals for the future. Incorporating has more benefits than just liability; see if any of these benefits are of interest to you.

</comment><comment><USER17> I would suggest you do it the other way round; create more side projects, monetize them, form LLC. Not sure why you need to protect liability for your side projects.

</comment><comment><USER18> Be sure you check into the minimum tax... CA has about an $800 minimum tax on S-Corps and may have one for LLCs too.

<comment><USER19> It holds for LLCs too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> One thing I would note, if you plan to open a business checking account most banks will want to see the tax id number for your business.

</comment><comment><USER21> Advantage to making an LLC: Interns of all sorts will work for you for free, even just doing your taxes for you, since you can give them a credible spot on their resume. My friend who went to Y-Combinator has an intern right now for that reason, it's great.

<comment><USER22> This is very likely to be illegal.

[http://www.mndaily.com/2010/04/22/unpaid-internships- under-i...](http://www.mndaily.com/2010/04/22/unpaid-internships-under- investigation)</comment></comment>


U.S. Fossil Fuel Subsidies Exceed Pentagon Spending - <AUTHOR> https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/fossil-fuel-subsidies-pentagon-spending-imf-report-833035/ <comment><USER2> This is garbage reporting, surprising for _Rolling Stone._

The so-called "subsidies" are an attempt to put a price tag on the externalities of carbon emissions. The story says the "subsidies" don't appear on any budget. Well, duh, you idiot who wrote this, that's because no money changed hands! No money = not a subsidy.

This smells like another BS story from the nuke industry. Some shill posts this kind of crap here nearly every day.

Oil is cheap. It works. It has raised the standard of living of billions of people. Oil improves every aspect of our life from food supply and medicine to transportation and housing. Without fossil fuels the world would return to the pre-industrial era. If someone personally wants to live that way, be my guest, but stop trying to convince everyone else to.</comment>