[thebmax]

Agreed. Fuck Benchmark. Travis makes each partner $1 billion personally and this is how they treat him? They should be blackballed by every great founder out there. I had respect for benchmark but not anymore. They are greedy assholes.

[sctb]

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14983424 and marked it off-topic.

[bearcobra]

A question I've been pondering since the Martin Shkreli verdict, is fraud OK if the deceived parties still profit?

[shallot_router]

Yes. You can't take a bunch of money from investors and then lie to them and tell them their money's doing great when most of it's actually gone, even if you do later manage to hit it big and pay them back. Imagine the kind of precedent that would set if this weren't considered fraud. "Temporary Ponzi schemes" would spring up everywhere.

Maybe it changes the charges and the sentencing, if there is no indication that the person sought to personally profit or steal from the investors, but lying is lying.

[sah2ed]

Fraud is never OK. The end does not justify the means.

[angersock]

What a small-minded view. Our entire runs on fraud of one degree or another--sometimes it's just more than people are willing to bear.

[sah2ed]

You are joking right?

The question about fraud was in the context of the misappropriation of capital from investors for a purpose different from what was initially agreed to, and not as a general catch-all term for posturing or affectation either by politicians or the general populace.

[angersock]

Hell, you could make the same argument about a company jumping into a different product line with capital intended for a particular buildout.

Your blanket statement "this is never is justified" was my primary objection.

[danielam]

A consequentialist might argue that it is, but then, consequentialists are wrong.

[EthanHeilman]

Given human nature, widespread belief in consequentialism as an ethical system would likely result is very bad consequences. So from the position that consequentialism is correct it is probably unethical to advocate as a correct viewpoint.

[shallot_router]

What if (purely hypothically) all consequentialists could agree on the same set of standards for what constitutes positive and negative utility?

[EthanHeilman]

How do you think this purely hypothetical conspiracy of consequentialists would go about convincing people to follow that set of standards?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie#Plato.27s_Republic

[sb8244]

Does money absolve a founder from potentially fraudulent behavior?

[adventured]

Only if you're willing to give a pass on that type of behavior based on generated returns. Wall Street has certainly historically been filled to the brim with that approach. The problem, typical even on Wall St., is that fraudulent behavior tends to be derived from the person's character, not a one-off. The odds are very high - in my opinion - that it would happen again. The Wall St. types that cross the line to generate returns, seem to frequently also light the house on fire given enough time.

[SomeStupidPoint]

It seems like newspeak to call people "greedy" for suing someone despite that they (nominally) made a lot of money for those people. It seems like the fund is insisting that its investments follow the law, not indemnify criminal actions, etc. Doing that to an investment that made you money seems the opposite of greedy.

How are we seeing this so differently?

[abiox]

> It seems like the fund is insisting that its investments follow the law

the fund is not the police or courts, though... right? it's not their "job" to ensure the law is asserted upon the land - at least not beyond their own avoidance of wrongdoing.

> not indemnify criminal actions

IANAL, but the state is the plaintiff in criminal cases. this case just seems to be benchmark asking that newly added board seats be removed.

[SomeStupidPoint]

> at least not beyond their own avoidance of wrongdoing

Such as enforcing that people contracted to carry out work on their behalf do so in a manner that conforms to their ethical stands?

A fund policing the habits of an investment is literally the people who own the business policing the actions of their employees -- I think most of us agree that a business has the right to enforce ethical standards on employees.

> not the police or courts

Both of these institutions are primarily complaint driven -- the fund filed a complaint that people they employed violated the rules of their employment and is asking the courts to make it right. (Slight more convoluted, but that's the gist of it.)

> state is the plaintiff in criminal cases

That has nothing to do with indemnifying someone from the financial consequences of their actions -- a third party can offer to pay your penalties.

> seems to be benchmark asking that newly added board seats be removed

Are there no prior cases where board actions to create board seats were reverse because of fraud? I'm skeptical.

But more to the point -- so what? We have well established law that you can revisit agreements made on a fraudulent basis and they're asking the courts to mediate just such a dispute.

I'm actually unsure how you think any of this should work based on your objections, aside from that corporate managers shouldn't be liable, even to the corporate owners, for their actions.

[abiox]

> A fund policing the habits of an investment is literally the people who own the business policing the actions of their employees

this seems to be equivocating on "policing".

> That has nothing to do with indemnifying someone from the financial consequences of their actions

you stated "criminal actions". if kalanick committed a crime, it is the state that pursues this in court. afaik all that is occurring is that benchmark is pursuing a civil case.

> Are there no prior cases where board actions to create board seats were reverse because of fraud?

are you referring to criminal or civil wrongdoing?

> I'm actually unsure how you think any of this should work based on your objections

it just seemed to me that you were suggesting private entities pursue criminals and "fight crime", perhaps as some form of vigilantism. ...perhaps like batman?

[SomeStupidPoint]

> if kalanick committed a crime, it is the state that pursues this in court

That's actually not how it works -- there can be both civil and criminal proceedings for a case, and very often criminal proceedings follow a complaint by a victim. The criminal proceedings deals with punishments related to breaking the law; the civil proceedings deal with damages caused to people (or businesses) by the crimes.

Also, indemnification has nothing to do with prosecution versus civil suit -- it's an agreement to pay the damages and fines related to the person's actions.

> suggesting private entities pursue criminals and "fight crime", perhaps as some form of vigilantism

They absolutely should!

By filing complaints and suing for damages that result from the actions of criminals -- which is what the fund is doing here.

A criminal may still be liable for damages via civil suit even if there's a lack of prosecution or an acquittal. People can (and should!) make use of the courts to pursue criminals.

[matt4077]

This is a civil matter, not criminal. Yet.

The fund alleges that they were the injured party, because Kalanick lied about and/or didn't disclose facts which were material to their decision.

Besides, it's common practice at that level to inform law enforcement when crimes are suspected. See, for example, Pepsi calling the FBI when they were offered CocaCola's recipe.

[chinathrow]

> Travis makes each partner a $1 billion personally

On paper.

[jethro_tell]

Yeah, not if the company gets banned from self driving car tech for 10 years or something. This will likely have an impact on the value of uber on paper or other.

[arikr]

*Before carry