I like to think Sam is a relatively sane guy with good intentions. He seems to have wrote this to send a message, which means he believes in the principal of what he's doing, which is what makes it easy to trust.
It actually seems a lot more unfathomable to me that an expert & thought-leader in startups would (1) be wrong & (2) risk his personal reputation just to make a bit more money. Finally, given the timing, it's pretty obvious Jeremy is shaking down his (ex?) friend for some money.
If you believe equity should be granted out of thin air for working on something then well, you live in a different world than I do my friend. I trust the legal system (via contracts) to lock something like this down otherwise it's literally heresay.
> I like to think Sam is a relatively sane guy with good intentions.
So do I. I think he genuinely believes everything in this article and it's not out of self-interest.
I just disagree.
> If you believe equity should be granted out of thin air for working on something then well, you live in a different world than I do my friend.
First of all, all equity is granted "out of thin air." It's an abstract concept. Without an agreed upon definition of the conditions whereby equity can be lost, it inherently flows to whoever worked on the project.
If someone worked on a startup for 11 months and then quit, should he still get equity? What about if he wasn't getting paid? What if he was fired? What if it was actually for 4 years?
There isn't any intrinsic answer to these questions and that's why we have legal agreements which spell out the answers. Just because an agreement wasn't signed does not mean Jeremy isn't entitled to compensation. A company can't refuse to pay you if they forgot to give you an official offer letter.
I absolutely agree that contracts should be used to lock these things down. But there weren't contracts in place. Sam makes a lame appeal to a universal "implied" contract of there being 1-year cliffs, but the fact is that many people wouldn't sign such a contract. (I, for one, don't think it's ethical to leave founders who forego salaries with literally no compensation, even if they leave in the first year.)
But lets not forget Sam has a vested interest in this deal going through. To say he is not biased would be completely incorrect.
"It actually seems a lot more unfathomable to me that an expert & thought-leader in startups would (1) be wrong & (2) risk his personal reputation just to make a bit more money. Finally, given the timing, it's pretty obvious Jeremy is shaking down his (ex?) friend for some money."
People can also be delusional and think they are in the right. No amount of so called 'success' can prevent that.
Regardless of who is right in this situation, this is a completely distasteful post.
It actually seems a lot more unfathomable to me that an expert & thought-leader in startups would (1) be wrong & (2) risk his personal reputation just to make a bit more money. Finally, given the timing, it's pretty obvious Jeremy is shaking down his (ex?) friend for some money.
If you believe equity should be granted out of thin air for working on something then well, you live in a different world than I do my friend. I trust the legal system (via contracts) to lock something like this down otherwise it's literally heresay.