> You agreed to this when you signed up

Have you ever actually worked in a start up?

That's not how it works. You can negotiate whatever you want. The deal can still change out form under you as new investors come on.

Not to mention, you're negotiating from a point of information asymmetry. They know way more about their plans for the company than you do and will often tell you what you want to hear rather than the truth. You can make some attempts at discerning if they're being honest or not, but ultimately you're left to just make a guess.

They also enter the negotiation from a strong position economically. They aren't going to miss a rent payment without a Job. The company itself may be fucked if they can't hire, but not the investors/founders.

So the negotiation is inherently unfair from the start.

> Sounds like many in this thread just have a sort of spilled milk viewpoint. No one forced you to work for these startups.

This is not relevant to whether their actions were moral, ethical or fair.

▲

csallen 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You can ask about all of these things during negotiations, and an increasingly large share of people do. I'm grateful for LLMs, because they're making people much better and more knowledgeable negotiators.

Ultimately it's possible to get screwed, but you can also choose not to work at startups and get a traditional job with less risk.

And the existence of some bad actors and screwy deals in the startup community is not really valid commentary on the greater picture of "the way wealth is shared." That was one way that wealth was shared, at one company, in one industry, with one or several bad actors.

▲

ceejayoz 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> I'm grateful for LLMs, because they're making people much better and more knowledgeable negotiators.

Just to be clear, we're talking about the same LLMs that were recently silently tuned to kneecap competitors? https://www.wired.com/story/anthropic-responds-to-backlash-o...

	▲	satvikpendem an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Not sure what that has to do with LLMs helping individuals. Even if you don't trust American ones, there are other open weight ones.

▲

lkjdsklf 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> That was one way that wealth was shared, at one company, in one industry, with one or several bad actors.

Except it's not. It's the norm not the exception. It's pervasive through the industry, and YC and pg have done it themselves to multiple companies.

Hence why it was literally turned into a meme plot on a TV show.

You also ignored the bit about the negotiation being inherently unfair from the get go. And again, the deal can (and almost assuredly will) change out from under you because of the structure of the company which isn't really up for negotiation.

	▲	csallen an hour ago \| parent [-]
		I disagree, and I've never seen any stats to support your belief that people getting screwed is the norm. But I've seen many, many stats of new startups minting millionaires.

▲

satvikpendem an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

> Have you ever actually worked in a start up?

Yes, many in fact. We negotiated the terms up front and if I didn't like them then I went with another offering company. I never had deals change from under me, maybe you're some Eduardo Saverin but I'm not. That you got screwed for not doing your due diligence doesn't mean everyone does. I'm not sure what is immoral, unethical, or unfair about that when again no one is forcing you to work at any particular company or even startups, or even in the tech industry. There are lots of jobs you can do.