Mr. Bezos thinks very highly of himself. As a former Amazon employee, we had to watch videos of him telling us about The Amazon Way and how if you follow his advice, you too can make the big bucks. His personal vanity doesn’t allow for him to believe he’s wrong.
A friend of mine tried really hard to recruit me for their team at Amazon (I am a product manager and I currently work in IT certifications and education) and I told them flat out that I would never ever work for Amazon in any form.
Well, I guess it is an ex-friend, as she hasn't talked to me since I told her that.
Heh! Yeah, their recruitment machine, especially when referral bonuses are involved, is wild. I am also in tech and used to get hit up by their recruiters multiple times / week. One day I cracked the code, though -- told the recruiter the only job I wanted at Amazon would be union organizer. And just like that, the recruiters found someone else to bother!
Not worth keeping that sort of friends anyway. I work for another Big Tech, and would not be offended if someone said they wouldn't work for my company, and my Amazon friends (who I dearly wish would get out) wouldn't think badly of me if I tell them I won't consider a job there either
True that. What was weird is that every Amazonian tracks (or tracked) Jeff Bezo's wealth because a large fraction of their comp is in Amazon stock, so they were hyper aware of his wealth as it is tied to their compensation.
That's interesting. I know what my company's stock price is (not on a day to day basis, I sell at vest) but I don't bother checking how much the CEO is worth
Also interestingly, I hear Amazon would sometimes readjust the outstanding RSUs if the stock price increases too much (boo) and sometimes if the stock tanks (not as often, bah) so it's not like they always benefit from a stock price increase anyway
When she was trying to hire me, she almost forgot to mention that the highest salary they paid was like $160K, and the stock was where all the upside was.
Like I was going to give up 20% of my base for something tied to stock performance…
That and the average tenure of a product manager at Amazon was like 18 months, so most of that stock is meaningless if you don’t stay long enough to vest.
Yeah, that was uniquely Amazon (the artificially low base). Supposedly they make it up in bonuses and such but heck, no way do I want to be beholden to my company's good graces to that extent
What I seriously wonder about is what will happen to the many H1B visa workers since Trump is going to deport everyone. And the other thing about Amazon is, for a programmer like me, it was such a sausage fest there. That in and of itself is what made me get another job. They literally thought I could not program like they could.
Sausage Fest? If you could only hear me laugh. Whew. I've worked at places like that before. As a full grown adult male I take exception to the primitive primates who walk among us and although they're supposedly intelligent, these immature throwbacks richly deserve to be thrown back.
Please, shift your suppositions...Trump will never become president again. He will fight like hell because he wants to avoid all accountability and possible imprisonment.
I wish I were as confident as you that Trump will not win. I don’t know that, I hope that he will not win. But it’s hard to trust that our system will hold up against all these corrupt politicians who are apparently going to try to overturn a legitimate election. As Trump says, he has a secret with Mike Johnson, so I fear they will try to forcibly take over, even if she wins. I fear internecine violence against people who might look like immigrants, this is a bad time in America with a bunch of players who don’t give as shit about anything but Trump and taking over whether they win or not. So I’m guarded and preparing myself mentally for him.
I understand being guarded. But let’s avoid being defeatist and in that way defeating ourselves. Our vote is our power. If the House goes blue, Mr. Johnson will have no role to play. Otherwise, he would need the Senate to play along or revert to his specialty - lawsuits.
They are still, losing lawsuits. 2 more yesterday. Marc Elias spoke yesterday about his confidence in upholding the legal line.
Johnson is laughing and claiming ‘the secret’ is a get out the vote tactic to win Congress. In other words, no matter whether the plan is real or not, announcing it was a way to sow more distrust and fear. A tactic to condition people to expect defeat and to discourage people from voting.
I was not raised in America, I was raised in a place with both prior to and after a military dictatorship happened. I was evacuated during that time and spent quite a bit of time under watch in an Intercontinental hotel. My reasons for worry are well founded I lived through it.
But it is part of their bag of tricks to make it look as though there is no escape from them taking power. Our Commander in Chief President Biden, not trump. The House has no role in deploying the military. This time neither does trump.
Teresa..the goal of Fascists is to keep you scared to death. They wouldn’t have to plan 25 ways to cheat if they thought they could win. Once we get a vote proof majority in Congress they are fried, and they know it. They are pretending it’s a close election so they can scream that something must be wrong, after they lose…AGAIN.
Unless your dad can give you 250,000 to start your business in the 90s, it might not workout for you! Because in reality while Bezos idea was great, ultimately his dad gave him the money in the 90s to start his business, just like Bill Gates dad helped him. The thing about Gates is, he doesn’t deny it, and Bezos doesn’t talk about it.
Another "self-made man," eh? He did have a clever idea. But armed with a clever idea and sufficient seed-money, any of us could do well. That''s nothing special.
I was very shocked; but should have given more weight to this discipleship. Murdoch has done more to wreck America than almost anyone; but Musk is close and Trump, of course is sui generis. No Murdoch, No Trump.
Both the WaPo and the NYT have been on a long slide into irrelevance for years as people shift their news consumption from old line outlets to social media and substacks. And this slide has been accelerating under Trump's shadow. The NYT prints tripe from Nepo Baby Maggie Haberman and Access is Everything Peter Baker. Bezos installs a Murdoch clone and pulls a Harris endorsement. All I can say is at least the NYT has gone hard against Trump editorially in the past month. Not bad, only 9 years too late but better than nothing. The Post is hopeless. But as a couple of others have said - The Philadelphia Inquirer and Will Bunch are, and have never pulled their punches on Trump or any other corrupt politician.
YES! And also remember the trusty Philadelphia Inquirer, owned by the nonprofit Lenfest Institute for Journalism, as another valued independent media outlet to support. They and Will Bunch have been taking truthful stances along with the others you mention. :-)
My grandson is a freshman in high school whose English teacher says has a great writing ability…I’ve sent him many of Judd’s articles..learning from the best. Judd Legum is one of the best!
Another flaw in Bezos's explanation -- "[e]very day, somewhere, some Amazon executive or Blue Origin executive or someone from the other philanthropies and companies I own or invest in is meeting with government officials."
Popular Info defines journalism. Add The Guardian to your list, and agree with the Philly Inquirer. We will continue to curate our news sources to get the truth.
Actually, Bezos did us all a huge favor last week by confirming his vanity project’s (aka the WAPO) inexorable slide into Republicanism and trump support. This has been coming for years, only accelerated by Bezo’s hiring of Lewis.
I had started to dread opening the Post every single day, praying they hadn’t bashed Biden-then-Harris for some alleged transgressions while simultaneously sane washing trump by “interpreting” his wannabe dictator gibberish into English. I was sorely and utterly disappointed. Canceling my subscription on Friday was, frankly, a relief! I had subscribed for 22 years. 😔
I believe oligarchs are out of control in this Country. Robber Barons in the 1930s were reined in by an FDR election. I certainly hope Harris prevails and Democrats take the House and Senate, too. I hope that the Democratic Party could get the numbers in the Legislature to be able to bring oligarchs like Musk and Thiel under control and make them pay their fair share to support the Country. It’s up to us. And thank goodness for publications like this and the newspapers and other alternative publications that speak the truth.
I feel like outlets like WaPo will continue to lose talent and, more importantly for their bottom line, paid subscribers if they allow their coverage to be dominated (or directly controlled) by moneyed interests. Independent sources like Popular Information are the way.
Not only did you call out his hypocrisy, you brought receipts & offered alternatives. Bravo Judd! 👏 THIS is why I’m a paid subscriber and have been for years.
The result? Journalism died at WAPO - notwithstanding the credible journalists being employed there. They are all under the heel of Bezos’ and his business interests. Where money & power trumps (forgive me) integrity.
off-topic, I cannot bring myself to use that name as a verb ever since tffg came onto the political scene, and am glad I do not play bridge as that verb is unavoidable in the game.
I cancelled WaPo two days ago. I renewed my subscription to Popular Information instead. What Bezos did is exactly what happens to countries slipping into fascism all over the world. Silencing the press.
Thanks for your reporting on this issue Judd. It's another example in a long line of examples of how Billionaires RUIN everything. Especially journalism & reporting facts. They dont care about that, they only care about PROFIT. how much money can they make from their media / "news" company. Not surprising a Murdoch Puppet is in charge at WaPo. Another Example is the Fascist who owns the LA Times. Some seem to not care about money, ex: Muskkkrat, who with Putins $$$ bought Twitter to use as an Anti American, Anti Democracy Propaganda outlet. We need to force Billionaires to sell their media / news companies and get non-profits to buy them so we can have honest, objective, fair & truthful reporting. #voteBluetoSaveAmerica
Mr. Bezos thinks very highly of himself. As a former Amazon employee, we had to watch videos of him telling us about The Amazon Way and how if you follow his advice, you too can make the big bucks. His personal vanity doesn’t allow for him to believe he’s wrong.
A friend of mine tried really hard to recruit me for their team at Amazon (I am a product manager and I currently work in IT certifications and education) and I told them flat out that I would never ever work for Amazon in any form.
Well, I guess it is an ex-friend, as she hasn't talked to me since I told her that.
Heh! Yeah, their recruitment machine, especially when referral bonuses are involved, is wild. I am also in tech and used to get hit up by their recruiters multiple times / week. One day I cracked the code, though -- told the recruiter the only job I wanted at Amazon would be union organizer. And just like that, the recruiters found someone else to bother!
Beautiful!
She is company girl and thus is not for you.
Not worth keeping that sort of friends anyway. I work for another Big Tech, and would not be offended if someone said they wouldn't work for my company, and my Amazon friends (who I dearly wish would get out) wouldn't think badly of me if I tell them I won't consider a job there either
True that. What was weird is that every Amazonian tracks (or tracked) Jeff Bezo's wealth because a large fraction of their comp is in Amazon stock, so they were hyper aware of his wealth as it is tied to their compensation.
That felt very cult like.
That's interesting. I know what my company's stock price is (not on a day to day basis, I sell at vest) but I don't bother checking how much the CEO is worth
Also interestingly, I hear Amazon would sometimes readjust the outstanding RSUs if the stock price increases too much (boo) and sometimes if the stock tanks (not as often, bah) so it's not like they always benefit from a stock price increase anyway
When she was trying to hire me, she almost forgot to mention that the highest salary they paid was like $160K, and the stock was where all the upside was.
Like I was going to give up 20% of my base for something tied to stock performance…
That and the average tenure of a product manager at Amazon was like 18 months, so most of that stock is meaningless if you don’t stay long enough to vest.
Lots of red flags
Yeah, that was uniquely Amazon (the artificially low base). Supposedly they make it up in bonuses and such but heck, no way do I want to be beholden to my company's good graces to that extent
Cultists don't like those who put chips in the smooth glass of their delusions.
What I seriously wonder about is what will happen to the many H1B visa workers since Trump is going to deport everyone. And the other thing about Amazon is, for a programmer like me, it was such a sausage fest there. That in and of itself is what made me get another job. They literally thought I could not program like they could.
Sausage Fest? If you could only hear me laugh. Whew. I've worked at places like that before. As a full grown adult male I take exception to the primitive primates who walk among us and although they're supposedly intelligent, these immature throwbacks richly deserve to be thrown back.
Please, shift your suppositions...Trump will never become president again. He will fight like hell because he wants to avoid all accountability and possible imprisonment.
I wish I were as confident as you that Trump will not win. I don’t know that, I hope that he will not win. But it’s hard to trust that our system will hold up against all these corrupt politicians who are apparently going to try to overturn a legitimate election. As Trump says, he has a secret with Mike Johnson, so I fear they will try to forcibly take over, even if she wins. I fear internecine violence against people who might look like immigrants, this is a bad time in America with a bunch of players who don’t give as shit about anything but Trump and taking over whether they win or not. So I’m guarded and preparing myself mentally for him.
I understand being guarded. But let’s avoid being defeatist and in that way defeating ourselves. Our vote is our power. If the House goes blue, Mr. Johnson will have no role to play. Otherwise, he would need the Senate to play along or revert to his specialty - lawsuits.
They are still, losing lawsuits. 2 more yesterday. Marc Elias spoke yesterday about his confidence in upholding the legal line.
Johnson is laughing and claiming ‘the secret’ is a get out the vote tactic to win Congress. In other words, no matter whether the plan is real or not, announcing it was a way to sow more distrust and fear. A tactic to condition people to expect defeat and to discourage people from voting.
I was not raised in America, I was raised in a place with both prior to and after a military dictatorship happened. I was evacuated during that time and spent quite a bit of time under watch in an Intercontinental hotel. My reasons for worry are well founded I lived through it.
I said I understood being guarded.
But it is part of their bag of tricks to make it look as though there is no escape from them taking power. Our Commander in Chief President Biden, not trump. The House has no role in deploying the military. This time neither does trump.
Teresa..the goal of Fascists is to keep you scared to death. They wouldn’t have to plan 25 ways to cheat if they thought they could win. Once we get a vote proof majority in Congress they are fried, and they know it. They are pretending it’s a close election so they can scream that something must be wrong, after they lose…AGAIN.
That’s my take Valerie 👍🏼
a perfect stooge for the orange traitor.
"The Amazon Way?"
Tell us what this could possibly be! Please? I wanna be a wealthy Richard-Head like Busy B. Bezos when I grows up.
Unless your dad can give you 250,000 to start your business in the 90s, it might not workout for you! Because in reality while Bezos idea was great, ultimately his dad gave him the money in the 90s to start his business, just like Bill Gates dad helped him. The thing about Gates is, he doesn’t deny it, and Bezos doesn’t talk about it.
Another "self-made man," eh? He did have a clever idea. But armed with a clever idea and sufficient seed-money, any of us could do well. That''s nothing special.
So he and Trump have a lot in common.
WOW! I didn't know about that "requirement" for Amazon workers. Sickening.
The Philadelphia Inquirer has maintained a critical voice in these chaotic times.
Shocking that a Murdoch disciple, Will Lewis, would lie to his employees and his readers.
I was very shocked; but should have given more weight to this discipleship. Murdoch has done more to wreck America than almost anyone; but Musk is close and Trump, of course is sui generis. No Murdoch, No Trump.
What's that old saw about how an apple doesn't fall far from the tree?
Rick Wilson said it best, “Everything Trump touches dies.”
Both the WaPo and the NYT have been on a long slide into irrelevance for years as people shift their news consumption from old line outlets to social media and substacks. And this slide has been accelerating under Trump's shadow. The NYT prints tripe from Nepo Baby Maggie Haberman and Access is Everything Peter Baker. Bezos installs a Murdoch clone and pulls a Harris endorsement. All I can say is at least the NYT has gone hard against Trump editorially in the past month. Not bad, only 9 years too late but better than nothing. The Post is hopeless. But as a couple of others have said - The Philadelphia Inquirer and Will Bunch are, and have never pulled their punches on Trump or any other corrupt politician.
YES! And also remember the trusty Philadelphia Inquirer, owned by the nonprofit Lenfest Institute for Journalism, as another valued independent media outlet to support. They and Will Bunch have been taking truthful stances along with the others you mention. :-)
Any reason Bezos could not make a charitable donation of WaPo to a public charity?
My grandson is a freshman in high school whose English teacher says has a great writing ability…I’ve sent him many of Judd’s articles..learning from the best. Judd Legum is one of the best!
Another flaw in Bezos's explanation -- "[e]very day, somewhere, some Amazon executive or Blue Origin executive or someone from the other philanthropies and companies I own or invest in is meeting with government officials."
Donald Trump is not a government official!
Well said Judd. Keep up the good work.
Popular Info defines journalism. Add The Guardian to your list, and agree with the Philly Inquirer. We will continue to curate our news sources to get the truth.
Actually, Bezos did us all a huge favor last week by confirming his vanity project’s (aka the WAPO) inexorable slide into Republicanism and trump support. This has been coming for years, only accelerated by Bezo’s hiring of Lewis.
I had started to dread opening the Post every single day, praying they hadn’t bashed Biden-then-Harris for some alleged transgressions while simultaneously sane washing trump by “interpreting” his wannabe dictator gibberish into English. I was sorely and utterly disappointed. Canceling my subscription on Friday was, frankly, a relief! I had subscribed for 22 years. 😔
Democracy dies in darkness. So do newspapers. Buh-bye, wapo
I believe oligarchs are out of control in this Country. Robber Barons in the 1930s were reined in by an FDR election. I certainly hope Harris prevails and Democrats take the House and Senate, too. I hope that the Democratic Party could get the numbers in the Legislature to be able to bring oligarchs like Musk and Thiel under control and make them pay their fair share to support the Country. It’s up to us. And thank goodness for publications like this and the newspapers and other alternative publications that speak the truth.
I feel like outlets like WaPo will continue to lose talent and, more importantly for their bottom line, paid subscribers if they allow their coverage to be dominated (or directly controlled) by moneyed interests. Independent sources like Popular Information are the way.
Not only did you call out his hypocrisy, you brought receipts & offered alternatives. Bravo Judd! 👏 THIS is why I’m a paid subscriber and have been for years.
The result? Journalism died at WAPO - notwithstanding the credible journalists being employed there. They are all under the heel of Bezos’ and his business interests. Where money & power trumps (forgive me) integrity.
off-topic, I cannot bring myself to use that name as a verb ever since tffg came onto the political scene, and am glad I do not play bridge as that verb is unavoidable in the game.
I cancelled WaPo two days ago. I renewed my subscription to Popular Information instead. What Bezos did is exactly what happens to countries slipping into fascism all over the world. Silencing the press.
Thanks for your reporting on this issue Judd. It's another example in a long line of examples of how Billionaires RUIN everything. Especially journalism & reporting facts. They dont care about that, they only care about PROFIT. how much money can they make from their media / "news" company. Not surprising a Murdoch Puppet is in charge at WaPo. Another Example is the Fascist who owns the LA Times. Some seem to not care about money, ex: Muskkkrat, who with Putins $$$ bought Twitter to use as an Anti American, Anti Democracy Propaganda outlet. We need to force Billionaires to sell their media / news companies and get non-profits to buy them so we can have honest, objective, fair & truthful reporting. #voteBluetoSaveAmerica