I genuinely don’t understand how we, as a society, reached a point where delusional businessmen like this exist. What can he possible do, to justify earning this much money, while his company is literally failing in real time
You gotta be dumb as fuck to work for free at a profit company
I think he’s the real reason the punchablefaces subreddit got neutered, because he’s sure got one.
The mods who stayed after the API desaster are lost.
That seems a little reductive. I’ve never moderated anything, but I bet if I spent years building up a community I would also find it hard to just walk away.
The best thing about his deeply fuckheaded comments is that it’s a perfect example of the sick way the ultra wealthy operate, presented in a way reddit users can absolutely understand.
The act of building early reddit was a group effort. I have no idea how much Spez contributed to the concept, but he did code it – a task that realistically millions of people also would have been able to do.
But a platform without users is nothing. It was the users creating content that truly built reddit and the unpaid moderators who stopped it collapsing under the weight of spam and extremism.
While that was happening, spez shit the bed over and over again. He sold out too early. He openly advocated platforming extremists. He got called out for the bigotry he tolerated in his company. He alienated his most important users so he could sell their content to AI companies.
And now here we are. He makes an absurd amount of money, despite being shit at his job, despite being a clearly bad person and despite his accomplishments being ordinary. Meanwhile, the people he needs, who are critical to his business, are paid nothing.
This is the same setup as Amazon, Walmart, Uber and a million other businesses, distilled down to its very essence.
he sold out too early
I’m actually kind of interested in this point. Going public for many people is about the growth in the company. No one wants to put money in apple because its stocks are expensive. Its because they forsee it going up.
But i thibk youre right he sold out too early. Peope are willing to invest because of the potential outcome of selling api data to ai companies. People are interested to hear the potential financial increase of api prices making more profit. People may be interested of the potential change of nfts or whatever to drive more money.
But all of that has already happened, hes sold out all those items before the ipo. So i feel like a lot of people are like “what growth left is there?” And infact “is that growth negative going forward as users turn away or are hungry to jump ship if possible”
Who knows though what will happen, maybe im entirely wrong.
He gifted himself a ludicrous $193 million compensation package.
Reddit, a 20-year-old company, has yet to turn a profit. In 2023, the platform lost a whopping $90.8 million.
Can someone explain to me how reddit can make a loss, while he pays himself MORE than the loss? Does that not mean that reddit would have made a 113 Million profit before his $193 million compensation package? What kind of business-algebra-gymnastics is at work here?
Does that not mean that reddit would have made a 113 Million profit before his $193 million compensation package?
No. His normal salary is around 300k a year. This $193 million figure was the presumed valuation of a stock/options package he received ahead of the IPO. It doesn’t cost the company anything to pay him in stock, so it doesn’t affect the profit/loss calculation.
Surely it costs $193 million to pay him in stock. That stock would otherwise have been sold for that amount to other people, and he’s getting it for nothing.
Because you’re exchanging stock worth $193 million for an equivalent amount of dollars, there’s technically no profit or loss involved in the transaction. In the same manner, when paying stock as a compensation, you secure services valued at $193 million for an amount of shares worth the same: the transaction is entirely equal. So you don’t make or lose any money by paying in stock.
Of course, the trick is that the value of the CEO’s work for one year can be whatever he says. If your claim is that they could have gotten more value out of the stock had they sold it in the IPO, I think you are absolutely correct in that regard.
He will continue unless he ran out of free labour force.
This is the norm for any big business. The top dogs will be wildly paid even if the company is struggling. They’ll get a big fat payday even if they get kicked out (golden parachute). Hell, even the bosses in the NYC Public Library system are pulling in close to a million bucks a year even as they talk about cutting services.
The NYC Library is a huge organization. They deserve that money.
Blame Mayor Adams for the budget. He paid millions for new radios for his police buddies. The old ones work fine, also… radios? That’s top priority?
Tax these mother fuckers. He probably paid next to no tax on that wage. Instead he should have paid 70% in taxes at least
