[michaelochurch]

Lawyer would have been nice, but I already signed an Employer Termination Contract, so what's done is done.

You signed it without a lawyer? Dear God...

What was in the contract? Did you get anything? Given that they clawed back a bunch of equity, you better have gotten 3 months' severance or a legally binding agreement to positive reference and introductions (at your demand) to present and future investors. An AoI (Agreement of Introduction) can make it worth it to go gently into the good night because those intros can make you a founder in your next gig.

If you got two weeks severance and no AoI, then you're an idiot and you should stop blogging about this before you embarrass yourself more. (I'm being blunt because people like you get screwed over every day and the only way to stop it is to fight harder when it happens.)

[dchichkov]

From pure math perspective that 1-yr cliff + 4-yr vesting function should be imperfect for employees AND for companies. Because of uncertainty of stocks ownership and a potential to create sharp conflicts of interests, lawsuits, etc. at the discontinuity. It is fine to have decelerated of accelerated vesting schedule. But there should be no discontinuities.

On the other hand, from a human perspective maybe having such conflict of interests is actually good. It gives a chance for CEO to show his true colors earlier and consequently for employees to take note and re-estimate the risk of having the same experience at some later time or even during the exit.