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alexggordon

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alexggordon
·vor 4 Monaten·discuss
Nothing stopping both from being true. The court judgements[0] aren't faked. It genuinely appears Underwood really was screwed over. That said, it doesn't take much for a CMO to look at the situation and figure out how to market the product from there. Something something lemonade.

Only reason I mention that is that is you're not really faking the grassroots part if you really do have a good origin story--you just got... lucky?

[0] https://cases.justia.com/california/court-of-appeal/2021-b30...
alexggordon
·letztes Jahr·discuss
Archive.org link

https://web.archive.org/web/20250407131025/https://www.newyo...
alexggordon
·vor 3 Jahren·discuss
I'm a huge supporter of GitLab, I love their product. Facilitated the use of it for my work and really admire how open their product development and company morals are. So when I say that this is probably one of the worst decisions they can make I hope you can understand I don't say that casually.

The problem with running an open company (check out their handbook[0] if you don't understand what I'm referencing) is that you can be held accountable to your values when you break them. All these blog posts regarding the "current macroeconomic climate" make it sound as though they've been blindsided by the downturn in the economy. To me, that's just a straw man. If you listened to any economist or financial adverser, even while the economy was doing okay in 2022, most knew there was a recession coming[0].

Even if they didn't know that, and they were completely ignorant (of which I would expect multiple executive level firings), they bragged in the Q3 Earnings Call on 12/05/2022 that "We added over 200 new team members in 3Q and we continue to experience lower attrition than the industry"[2], undoubtedly as they were planning layoffs. According to Wikipedia, Gitlab had 1,630 employees in January of 2022, so assuming they added 500 new employees in 2022, 7% layoffs would be about 150 positions. Given that, I love this quote from that same call[2].

> As Sid and I have said over the last several quarters, our number one priority is growth but we will do this responsibly.

The "I" that quote is Sharlene Seemungal, acting CISO[3]. I don't even have to research the layoffs to know that neither Sid nor Sharlene have suffered from the layoffs.

All that said, it's laudable the level of investment you took in ensuring the employees you laid off have a good transition--but it would be better if you didn't play the corporate bullshit shocked pikachu face game when the downturn everyone knew was coming came and actually hired responsibly.

[0] https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/values/

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/09/recession-will-hit-in-first-...

[2] https://ir.gitlab.com/static-files/96839a79-517d-4d92-989f-9...

[3] https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/eba/
alexggordon
·vor 4 Jahren·discuss
Note, these are not normal bikes. From the article:

> A major cause of head injuries is going over the handlebars, which is not possible with a 3 metre long bike. Another thing that makes us unique is our training systems, maintenance systems, and ability to track poor rider behaviour.

Made me curious what they actually look like[0].

Seeing that, I’d tend to reset my presumptions about wearing helmets with these. There’s definitely going to be a different injury profile with these bikes than the bikes you rode as a kid. Without seeing those injury profiles I’d probably say you can’t really deduce anything from this announcement.

[0] https://www.positive.news/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Pedal-M...
alexggordon
·vor 5 Jahren·discuss
All due respect but this comment demonstrates a naive understanding of COVID and mask mandates. It's possible this comment is just trolling as it's the only comment your account has made but I'll attempt to address the issues with it regardless.

First, calculating a theoretical number of deaths through end result statistics does not result in a number that can be used to support a logical argument. When approximating deaths for something like COVID, the things that matter are:

1. The fatality rate of COVID, assuming the hospital you're treated at has sufficient means to treat you.

2. The fatality rate of COVID, assuming the hospital you're treated at does NOT have sufficient means to treat you.

3. The contagiousness/ability of the virus and likelihood that you'll spread the virus to someone else once you've contracted it (R naught). Basically, think of this as the number of people you'll infect if you get the virus.

4. The number of people in a population who can be infected by an individual at any specific time (effective reproduction number)

You can't just take a slice of time and say "6" people will die, and remove mask mandates, as COVID spreads through exponential growth. The benefits of wearing a mask compound, just like not wearing mask compounds in a worse way. Think of it this way. If the R naught of a virus is above 1, (say 1.1) then the virus will continue to spread. If it continues to infect more and more people, unchecked, it will eventually infect almost everyone. If it infects everyone, with a fatality rate of 1.6% in Missouri, it will kill thousands, not 6.

The ways available to us to stop COVID are to attack all facets mentioned above. I won't go into all of them, as mask mandates solely aim to curb 3. The goal of mask mandates is to make it so if you have the virus, you infect less than 1 person, so that the virus stops spreading.[1] But the benefits affect all the above, such as, if the virus continues to spread (R naught above 1), then eventually we run out of hospital capacity. If we run out of hospital capacity, the death rate skyrockets, as many preventable deaths are no longer preventable. So, mask mandates now also potentially benefit healthcare capacity (flatten the curve, remember?).

So, to specifically isolate the issue with your argument, the number of cases per 100k with and without masks doesn't matter if the virus is still spreading. If it's still spreading, it will still infect everyone eventually, and take its 1.6% of the population at the end of the day. Mask mandates are one component (on top of vaccines, social distancing, hygiene, etc) to lowering the R naught below 1.

So, is it reasonable, to impose a mandate such as this that negatively alters people daily life to this extent, in order to prevent tens of thousands of deaths in the all-state from dying?

The answer is yes.

[0] Good introduction to R naught and R_e https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7751056/ [1] Thorough review of mask wearing statistics and benefits https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/118/4/e2014564118.full.pdf [2] A better introduction to modeling COVID 19 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-1132-9
alexggordon
·vor 10 Jahren·discuss
My only comment is that the proportions aren't actually the same :).

In Zurich you're netting three times what a German software engineer makes, but everything is only twice as expensive.
alexggordon
·vor 10 Jahren·discuss
Yeah, I think I forgot to select Zurich as the Canton of residence. Either way though, that helps my case.
alexggordon
·vor 10 Jahren·discuss
I'm the one that downvoted you. Rather than simply insulting s3nnyy, pull out some numbers to justify your statement. I suspect s3nnyy is not hiding information, but rather saying the quality of life is worth it.

However, it looks like the numbers are pretty comparable. In Germany a software engineer will average 47,500[0] euros a year. judging by this answer[1] I'm guessing your take home is going to be about 28,000 euros (2,333 euros a month), meaning about a 40% tax rate.

According to the same website a software engineer in Zurich will make 96,500[2] CHF. Using a swiss salary calculator, your take home in euros is 71,436[3] (5,953 euros a month).

Finally, comparing the cost of living, is clear to see that Germany is 50% cheaper[4], but you're making 150% more in Zurich. While my numbers may be the wrong averages to compare, it looks like Zurich is at least pretty comparable.

[0] http://www.payscale.com/research/DE/Job=Software_Engineer/Sa...

[1] https://www.quora.com/Is-45000-euros-per-year-considered-a-g...

[2] http://www.payscale.com/research/CH/Job=Software_Engineer/Sa...

[3] http://www.lohncomputer.ch/en/home.html

[4] http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?coun...