Comment by glenstein | Hacker News Reader

Comment by glenstein | Hacker News Reader

I first heard about Andy Yen from his claim that Gail Slater's appointment was proof the current administration will be more effective enforcing anti-trust and was the "party of the little guy." And lately he's saying stuff like this (from the linked 404 Media Article):

>According to the report, an employee in Proton's security Slack channel urged the company to take at least a few days to pentest newly written code before pushing it live. Yen replied, at the end of August: "That's bullshit and loser thinking. Of course it's possible to be fast and secure." He added: "Stop thinking always of how to be slower, and focus more on how to be faster." In a follow-up message he wrote "only losers think like that," and his message to the team was to "stop lovingly handcrafting all our code and use AI more."

I think he's terminally online in a way that fried his brain. And I used to think his 88 tattoo was just a coincidence but now I honestly would believe anything.

Words are important and Andy’s choice of language and delivery rightfully calls into question of his leadership capabilities.

It’s a stark contrast to the posts we’ve been seeing on Patrick Stewart’s portrayal of Picard as to what it means to be a good leader.

The problem is that some people think it's faster to be wrong 100 times with AI than to take the time to be right once with your human brain.

Is there anything corroborating this 88 tattoo? I will close my account with them tomorrow if I can see a believable source for this.

Unfortunately my recollection was dead wrong and it's apparently not a tattoo. At least I can't find anything corroborating my memory. Instead, it was part of his reddit handle. It frequently exists as a tattoo in the universe of iconography relating to that bad german political party which may be where my conflation came from but I don't see anything showing that he has it.

The post below discusses the user handle and its connotations (I'm less certain than this poster but nothing would surprise me at this point).

https://social.wildeboer.net/@jwildeboer/113850246346827615

I think he was just born in 1988...

Right, he said as much on reddit

88 is a very common lucky number across several Asian cultures - plenty of bands and artists, et.c will have 88 in their name because of that.

I assumed he was going to time travel..

OK so the 88 tattoo thing is not real, but it's pretty clear anyone that thought a second Trump term would do anything for the "little guy" or have the slightest interest in antitrust is a mark of the highest degree.

Andy Yen is simply a moron and proves it over and over.

> Of course it's possible to be fast and secure.

It's a trope: my cousin can do it cheaper.

"possible" does not mean guaranteed. And security guarantees are Proton's USP.

His own engineers tell him they need more testing to be sure, and he calls them losers.

It's as if an AI locked Andy Yen in his basement and is now impersonating him to add more bugs faster.

Exactly. It's like Elizabeth Holmes defending the generalizability of Theranos' diagnostic device, when it turns out the breakthrough innovation, the open-endedness of it's ability to test, is ultimately a semantic and philosophical idea about presumed future possibilities that it's notionally in contact with (e.g. via a "cloud platform").

It's taking a kind of semantic equivocation that's trivially true about any approach in any direction, and treating it like it's a specific advantage of a particular vision.

It's interesting because he could have said that using slightly different words and had a point and he could have even been right.

Engineers are delicate.

I'm on both sides of that fence always.

Instead of 'don't pent test' it should be 'proportional measures' and definitely should be trying to leverage AI as much as is possible. Which is complicated of course for a company that has a certain kind of brand. They literally do not need to be banging out features.

I think that's generous and would make more sense if he wasn't in leadership for the company. People in positions of power should always be cognizant of their power and language especially in public channels. It's not hard to do - plenty of secretly spiteful and totally-asshole-ish CEOs put a face on their sociopathy that allows them to be believably humble and human because, at minimum, it's not disruptive to employee morale.

If he can't even do that, he's ill-equipped to be leading a company.

Yes and no. CEO's are sometimes in a position where the culture of a system overwhelms them and aggressive moves are what is necessary.

Language barriers exist like 'loser move' - first - that may be a bit of a small translation problem - second - it's a cultural issue.

It 'sounds crude' to Western ears to hear 'loser move' ... but in the end it's not so bad.

It's just impolite.

A very small change in words would have made it sound different.

Adults can be adults and walk past dumb language: "over thinking delicate process instead of thinking of how to use tools to break through is what we must do" <- this it the obvious intent of the language.

I would not care if a CEO use the language he used - like - it would be dumb, and I would not use it, but I would not care.

This is very different than 'insulting a group' or something.

Aka 'women can't code as well as men, the science proves!' or some stuff like that - that would not be 'dumb language' that would be an assault on the legitimacy of people.

It also depends on how often and common this is, and if this is the only means of leadership.

If this is 'daily' - then its bad.

If this is not accompanied by structured communication aka if he wants 'change' then it has to be articulated in a meaningful way.

This is like Trumps invasion of Iran. DJT is an idiot, he did not plan, he acted impulsively, he says horrible and stupid things. But ironically - there is a rationalization that could have been made the whole way. Engaging with partners, building a coalition, having a strategy, recognizing the potential fallout, even 'bold moves' are allowable in that context. And even failure. A random blowhard tweet is tolerable, not a random blowhard culture.

Eh, it feels like a lot of the "adults can be adults" rests on an anti-mental health assumption - that everyone must be the most well-adjusted at all times with sufficient coping mechanisms for all stressors and anybody who isn't is simply too sensitive to cut it.

I think that's rarely the case in orgs and I say that as someone whose issues have been in remission for a decade+ and is reasonably confident in his work abilities and capabilities.

Responsible leadership models good behavior as a cultural norm. If you normalize language that puts people down, the entire ecosystem changes. I've seen it happen in plenty of companies after outside consultants were hired in as leadership.

There is also no rationalization for the Iran War that would have made sense logistically or morally especially not when diplomacy was proven to have worked - it was an exercise in converting taxpayer money into lucrative contracts for arms suppliers who just happen to occasionally gift a connected family member with yachts and watches. It's a terrible example.

If you can't handle the CEO saying 'not pushing forward is for losers' you're not ready for the trials of professional life.

And I don't mean to say "young people need to learn to take abuse".

I'm saying - there's nothing actually wrong with saying what he said, just tone and a misplaced word.

If he said "Not using AI is a losing proposition" ... totally different,

or 'losing game' or even colloquially 'loserville' ... same thing but slight change of words gives it different inflection.

There's nothing wrong with his statement really - it's just crude.

There's no reason it should affect anyone, that's not an issue of mental health, rather just learning to externalize and internalize the right things.

If it's anger directed downward, consistently - then yes - you have a point.

Would be better if you could fire back without being fired. High chance you write back to him in a similar tone, you’re donezo

Of course it would, that's not how it works though.

And yes, you can use that kind of tone if it's not directed upwards though, and you're a veteran or whatever, and if the leader does not have thin skin.

You have to know them personally though.

A VP can clap back at a CEO, that happens a lot in some orgs

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