I don't know how long you've been out of the workforce, but I haven't had a job that told me when to arrive, when to leave, how or where to do my work, or what to wear, in almost 20 years.
In the IT industry there's this different type of subtle authority. "Yeah you can come as you please" But your daily meeting is at 10am and everyone must be there. Oh, and you must be present at least until X pm because there must be enough overlapping hours, so your wiggle room becomes even smaller. "You make your own hours, overtime is totally not expected" But people who take time off the least and do the most (sometimes unpaid) overtime get promoted etc. etc. If you take what they say literally, you say goodbye to any chance of promotion and might even get called out as a "non-teamplayer". They will wait until you realize you will never go forward in the company like this and either you start doing overtime or quit.
"Unlimited vacation days" is the biggest joke. Seriously, there's nothing stopping you from never showing up to work? In reality it's a way to make sure nobody ever takes time off if they want to have any chance of promotion.
Yes, but what's the reason to believe that Coinbase employees can impact the Coinbase culture more than McDonalds employees can? In the case we're discussing now, they tried, and the CEO told them "don't let the door hit you on your way out."
"Unlimited vacation days" is the biggest joke. Seriously, there's nothing stopping you from never showing up to work? In reality it's a way to make sure nobody ever takes time off if they want to have any chance of promotion.