When you were younger and learned about history did you form a mental image of what kind of people the famous financiers, capitalists, and robber barons were?
These are those people. Oil and railroads were high technology too.
They want you to think they’re Lazlo Hollyfield, but they’re Daniel Plainview.
My read was that Garry Tan implied "you sacrificed a lot of money in order to grandstand". I felt that was a knee-jerk dismissal of a founding employee's legitimate concern.
I'm not sure, but my interpretation is that Gary is implying that Prem Qu Nair received $20 million from the deal, and that by posting this tweet, he has violated the terms of the agreement, which generally have non disparagement clauses, and Gary will see to it that he won't receive anything.
I believe Tan's words were mis-represented. I believe he is saying that it cost Prim $20M and he then wrote that post. I don't think he is insinuating anything else.
He's misrepresenting his own words when he writes a vague tweet like that. Tan is a serial shitposter and is known for blocking thousands of people that even slightly disagree with him.