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Everyone should read Steve Yegge's classic rant about Amazon (vs Google/Facebook)[1], in particular his description of Bezos:

"We're talking about a guy who in all seriousness has said on many public occasions that people should be paying him to work at Amazon. He hands out little yellow stickies with his name on them, reminding people "who runs the company" when they disagree with him. The guy is a regular... well, Steve Jobs, I guess. Except without the fashion or design sense. Bezos is super smart; don't get me wrong. He just makes ordinary control freaks look like stoned hippies."

1. https://plus.google.com/+RipRowan/posts/eVeouesvaVX



The recent NYT story also reminded me of this older Yegge rant, which touches on amazon:

http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2009/04/have-you-ever-legali...

> My stress level began approaching what I might call "Amazon levels", and I don't even work there anymore. Thank God.

> [...] my brother Mike, who was in the Navy on an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf during the 1990s Gulf War, and later worked at Amazon, and declared after four years that Amazon was _way_ more stressful

> [...] astonishingly, we actually managed to launch at least half those crazy ideas, by burning through people like little tea lights.


Every time I read it I'm confused about the first sentence... Does he mean everyone?


I interpret it as "employees are told they [employees] should be paying him [Bezos] for the privilege of being able to work at Amazon, rather than being paid a salary by Amazon".


While true. Most Amazonians don't work with Bezos directly.




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