Yishan Wong 2 days ago:<p>> Here's one.<p>> In 2006, reddit was sold to Conde Nast. It was soon obvious to many that the sale had been premature, the site was unmanaged and under-resourced under the old-media giant who simply didn't understand it and could never realize its full potential, so the founders and their allies in Y-Combinator (where reddit had been born) hatched an audacious plan to re-extract reddit from the clutches of the 100-year-old media conglomerate.<p>> Together with Sam Altman, they recruited a young up-and-coming technology manager with social media credentials. Alexis, who was on the interview panel for the new reddit CEO, would reject all other candidates except this one. The manager was to insist as a condition of taking the job that Conde Nast would have to give up significant ownership of the company, first to employees by justifying the need for equity to be able to hire top talent, bringing in Silicon Valley insiders to help run the company. After continuing to grow the company, he would then further dilute Conde Nast's ownership by raising money from a syndicate of Silicon Valley investors led by Sam Altman, now the President of Y-Combinator itself, who in the process would take a seat on the board.<p>> Once this was done, he and his team would manufacture a series of otherwise-improbable leadership crises, forcing the new board to scramble to find a new CEO, allowing Altman to use his position on the board to advocate for the re-introduction of the old founders, installing them on the board and as CEO, thus returning the company to their control and relegating Conde Nast to a position as minority shareholder.<p>> JUST KIDDING. There's no way that could happen.<p><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3cs78i/whats_the_best_long_con_you_ever_pulled/cszjqg2" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3cs78i/whats_the...</a>
It is the nature of the role of CEO that you're going to take the heat for all company decisions. That's one of the justifications for their outsized compensation. Greater risk = greater reward. No one is forced to be CEO and being an executive essentially means you live your life on the line every day. It's not for everyone.<p>There was another thread on this earlier today and I think my comment there is applicable here too...<p>--<p>Yishan seems to love to do stuff like this. While I personally find it interesting, it also seems pretty unprofessional. Some issues with this particular comment:<p>1. Yishan no longer works at Reddit so I don't think he can be considered an authoritative source for what happened.<p>2. Yishan appointed Pao so isn't unbiased when discussing her.<p>3. The CEO's job is to represent the company. The chairman's job is to appoint the CEO. The outcome of events seems correct even if what Yishan says is true.
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My suspicion is that Victoria was terminated for entirely legitimate reasons unrelated to the operation of /r/IAmA. She was a valuable employee and community member, and I don't believe the Reddit administration is foolish enough to remove her just because they wanted to modify (and possibly monetize) the format of AmAs. Much of the Reddit community frequently forgets that Reddit is a business (owned by a multinational media conglomerate, no less) that sometimes needs to make business decisions.
Ehm. This was known since the beginning: <a href="https://np.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/3c0hcz/welcome_back/" rel="nofollow">https://np.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/3c0hcz/welcome_back/</a><p>> Chooter (Victoria) was let go as an admin by /u/kn0thing.
Here is the permalink to the comment made: <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/3d2hv3/kn0thing_says_he_was_responsible_for_the_change/ct1ecxv" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/3d2hv3/kn0t...</a><p>I'm very curious to see if Alexis is responsible for the firing, then shouldn't the backlash against Ellen Pao change to be against Alexis Ohanian?
At the time I pointed out <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9827489" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9827489</a> that it was Alexis Ohanian who fired Victoria Taylor and set off the "blackout."<p>Ohanian seemed content to use Ellen Pao as a meatshield, whether she deserved it or not.<p>Imagine that: A Silicon Valley soap opera with no heros.
This is in the new york times?<p>> The protest was the latest episode in nine months of tumult for Reddit, a highly popular internet message board which has more than 160 million monthly visitors. Under Ms. Pao’s leadership, many users of the site have been upset with what they have perceived as <i>major challenges to free speech and a lack of censorship</i>. In May, Reddit users revolted when the company instituted <i>stricter guidelines against prohibiting harassment on the site</i>.
This is <i>very</i> similar to one of the reports swirling before. If true, it is pretty awful for Alexis to keep letting Ellen Pao take the hit for it. There are other reasons that people dislike Mrs. Pao, but she doesn't need this final straw if it is truly Alexis' straw to bear.
Notice also that this thread is now on the 5th page with 106 points at 9 hours at time of writing 12:59am EST 7/14.<p>In comparison there are currently older posts with less points or comments on the HN front page.<p>Obviously <i></i>someone<i></i> at YC/HN is driving this story down.
Why would Reddit have had a hard time simply installing Ohanian or Huffman as the CEO? Why would they need covert machinations to put the founders back at the helm?
Reddit isn't Twitter or Facebook where a post on the wall is fine. Reddit is a discussion platform which requires a bigger time commitment.<p>Having the goal to have celebrities / famous figures be part of the reddit community seems rather naive. Given the time commitment, it would seem that the pool of potential AmA's would dry up. Also, having Victoria do the leg work would seem familiar to celebrities who would view it as normal to have an event handler.
Just doesn't make sense. Sure, quickly eliminate someone's role, but why immediately fire the person? Why not even try to transition the person to a new role? Was she employed as an independent contractor?<p>Reddit clearly has both plenty of money, and plenty of work to be done. This explanation doesn't add up at all.
Would be nice to hear Victoria's story from Victoria.<p>Regardless, I think with her reputation and respect - she'll likely be doing something even more exciting.<p>She's wisely avoiding stirring muddy waters for now...