It's interesting to me how entitled the employees come across as. Minecraft was making millions, but they were only getting a regular salary. (Aside from luxury trips to Monaco with their families, and an extremely laid back and pleasant work environment.)
I remember that Notch was doing Minecraft development all alone for the longest time, even after it had become hugely popular, and users had been begging him to hire people to speed up development. So these employees join as regular employees, getting a regular salary, taking none of the risks of the founders, yet they are pissed off because they don't own shares of the company.
I suspect this is very common in successful startups, and in a way I understand it: They see the founders, guys their age, rolling in the dough, on the back of their work. I've felt the same way as an employee, when stuff I come up with and implement ends up making the company a lot of money and the most I get, if I'm lucky, is a pat on the back.
But, as a founder? Where the fuck do you get off expecting to take a piece of my company, that I have literally sacrificed blood, sweat and tears for, taken time away from my life and my family, risked huge amounts of money, relationships and years of my life, without any guarantee that I would ever succeed. And you take an interview, walk in the door from nine to five and do your job, which you get fairly compensated for, and would not be paid anymore for anywhere else, you can, and probably will, leave whenever you feel like it with no stress or loss. Yet because the company succeeds, somehow you are entitled to own parts of it for simply being there and doing your job?
I remember that Notch was doing Minecraft development all alone for the longest time, even after it had become hugely popular, and users had been begging him to hire people to speed up development. So these employees join as regular employees, getting a regular salary, taking none of the risks of the founders, yet they are pissed off because they don't own shares of the company.
I suspect this is very common in successful startups, and in a way I understand it: They see the founders, guys their age, rolling in the dough, on the back of their work. I've felt the same way as an employee, when stuff I come up with and implement ends up making the company a lot of money and the most I get, if I'm lucky, is a pat on the back.
But, as a founder? Where the fuck do you get off expecting to take a piece of my company, that I have literally sacrificed blood, sweat and tears for, taken time away from my life and my family, risked huge amounts of money, relationships and years of my life, without any guarantee that I would ever succeed. And you take an interview, walk in the door from nine to five and do your job, which you get fairly compensated for, and would not be paid anymore for anywhere else, you can, and probably will, leave whenever you feel like it with no stress or loss. Yet because the company succeeds, somehow you are entitled to own parts of it for simply being there and doing your job?