If you suffer from extreme secondhand embarrassment, you should stop reading this post right now and go look at these cats, instead.
If not, then gather 'round for a saucy Internet tale: Seeking redemption, or validation, or attention, or something else entirely, former reddit admin David Ehrmann took to the site yesterday with an AMA about his time at the company. And, like so many AMAs (for those who don't know, the site's popular Ask Me Anything Q&As between reddit users and the subjects are frequented by both celebrities and interesting non-famous folk alike), things got a little out of hand. When asked why he left, he responded: "I was laid off." When probed for more info, Ehrmann said that he was given no official reason but shared a theory that management took ill to concerns he raised about the company donating 10% of ad revenue to an unnamed charity. An employee terminated for expressing legitimate concerns about one of the most interesting companies in the digital landscape — scandalous, right?
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Well, that's only one side of the story. Reddit's CEO Yishan Wong chimed in 16 hours later with the below (emphasis his):
"Okay, there's been quite a bit of FUD in here, so I think it's time to clear things up.
You were fired for the following reasons:
1. Incompetence and not getting much work done.
2. Inappropriate or irrelevant comments/questions when interviewing candidates
3. Making incorrect comments in public about reddit's systems that you had very little knowledge of, even after having these errors pointed out by your peers and manager.
4. Not taking feedback from your manager or other engineers about any of these when given to you, continuing to do #2 until we removed you from interviewing, and never improving at #1.
"...Above all you need to get your work done, and you did not even come close to doing that. Lastly, you seem to be under the impression that the non-disparagement we asked you to sign was some sort of 'violation of free speech' attempt to muzzle you. Rather, the situation is thus: When an employee is dismissed from employment at a company, the policy of almost every company (including reddit) is not to comment, either publicly or internally. This is because companies have no desire to ruin someone's future employment prospects by broadcasting to the world that they were fired. In return, the polite expectation is that the employee will not go shooting their mouth off about the company especially (as in your case) through irresponsibly unfounded speculation... Unfortunately, you have just forfeited this arrangement."
Cue the resounding awkward silence. Mr. Wong has gotten both support and flak in the comments (nothing new — there's an entire subreddit dedicated to hating him), and he has explained that while he didn't want to post a response, it ultimately felt like the only option. We have to wonder if the original poster didn't see this coming (seriously, why would you speculate about your termination on your former employer's own platform?). But still, this exceptionally uncomfortable situation is a pretty apt reminder of just how careful you should be when it comes to public griping these days.
Read the full AMA here to see whose side you're on — or, let your upvotes decide).