[matt4077]

What ultimately got him wasn't his "maverick rule-bending to compete against the establishment".

He created this bro-themed caricature of a corporate culture, and he did so for no reason other than enjoying that sort of atmosphere, or being incompetent to stop it. Or both.

Let's not start some sort of myth of martyrdom around Kalanick by conflating these two. Although, yes, this strategy of braking local regulations and expecting to win a power struggle with every government anywhere was also on its last leg when he left, and would've gotten to him as well, sooner or later.

[monknomo]

"maverick rule-bending to compete against the establishment" seems like a really complementary way to say "lawbreaking company".

I mean, their whole model was to go places, ignore the law and continue operating until they either got thrown out, or they pumped money to the right places to get the law changed.

Scofflaw corps get nailed sooner or later, and a corp the is built on breaking laws might break some laws investors care about...

[fapjacks]

Perhaps, but I've heard politicians on the national level talk about this as just business as usual. If the system creating the laws sees "move fast and break things (like laws)" as the norm, then we can scold and shame all we want, but it's not going to change things. Regulatory capture and law-breaking startups seems to be what's expected out of American business by the very people doing the legislation.

[forapurpose]

Which politicians said what exactly? I read a lot of U.S. national news and I've never heard that.

[monknomo]

Certainly regulatory capture is a thing, as is law breaking.

Regulatory capture doesn't do you much good if nobody cares when a business breaks regulations, though :)

I think American society does care about businesses following laws and regulations. I think a narrow segment of the press is wowed by 'outlaw cool' and investor funding, but that is not the same as America as a whole.

Obviously corps are gonna lobby, but I think we as a society should and do draw a distinction between lobbying to change a law that you are not breaking and lobbying to change a law you are breaking. I am pretty sure most legislators who aren't closet anarchists take a dim view of things like that. I will wager a large amount that a vast majority of regulators take a dim view of things like that.

[cookiecaper]

I haven't really paid close attention. Are we basing our assumption that Uber was a "bro-themed caricature of a corporate culture" off the sexual harassment claim that kicked off the uproar a few months back?

While sexual harassment is, of course, indefensible, that story didn't really make Uber sound like the frat house implied by "bro-themed caricatures", it just makes them sound dryly indifferent to the employee's complaint. Are there other events that gave Uber that title?