Hacker news

  • Top
  • New
  • Past
  • Ask
  • Show
  • Jobs

Flock Offers Employees Buyouts as Customers Flee (https://www.wired.com)

88 points by ent101 1 day ago | 32 comments | View on ycombinator

Barbing 1 day ago |

Flock seeks to shed whistleblowers via financially-motivated self selection

> And we just want people to be safe.

We’d all be safer if we were in jail (sorry to give the clown ideas)

noworriesnate about 18 hours ago |

Why are they doing this when they're hiring:

https://www.workatastartup.com/companies/flock-safety

steve-atx-7600 about 6 hours ago |

My city right outside Austin scrapped it. Its even split between red and blue voters and support for abandoning flock was overwhelmingly in favor of abandoning. Makes me feel good to see others banding together for positive change in today’s political climate in the USA….even if the motivation comes from self interest (too used to “get your government hands off of my medicaid/care” deluded thinking).

babelfish about 24 hours ago |

0x737368 1 day ago |

I wonder if something similar will happen to Palantir et al.

1vuio0pswjnm7 about 18 hours ago |

"Founded in 2017, Flock raised money at a valuation of more than $8 billion in a funding round that closed in April."

ParentiSoundSys about 19 hours ago |

It would be nice to think this will significantly hamper Flock and its goals and methods in any way, but it will probably just have the effect of selecting for the employees who are either true believers, or are desperate enough that they'll keep their heads down and get good work done just to keep their jobs.

Sporadic vandalism, a handful of canceled contracts, some employee morale problems, all of this falls far short of the organized campaign of resistance that would be needed to roll back Flock at this point. Flock really should be the last nail in the coffin of Edward Snowden's libertarian take that mass surveillance can be fought only with individual action and technology rather than political movements.

redhale about 20 hours ago |

Oh nooooooo! /s

I cannot believe how tone deaf this quote is. Mind boggling. Veep, torture nexus-level parody.

> “Because you go on to X or you go on to Reddit and you go, why are people so mad at us when we've been doing the same thing for nine years?” Langley said. “And why are they so mad at us for things we don't do? And we just want people to be safe.”

I find this story to be heartwarming. I hope the employees flee to companies with missions and products more worthy of their talents.

FlockisYC2 about 15 hours ago |

[dead]

theturtle about 15 hours ago |

[dead]