5 ms·

NPM CEO Bryan Bogensberger Resigned

137 points by fharper 7y ago

meconium 7y ago
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/npm-inc-announces-leadership-change-300922517.html?tc=eml_cleartime https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/npm-inc-announces-l...
k__ 7y ago
Background: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/02/npm_abandons_settlement_talks/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/02/npm_abandons_settle...
hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
I wish companies would do away with the "leaving to pursue other opportunities" nonsense and just give no reasons if they don't want to discuss it. No C-level exec resigns "effective immediately" without either a transition plan in place or something concrete lined up. I get wanting to allow him to say he resigned instead of he was fired, but the silly language of the press release just makes it worse.
- Ididntdothis 7y ago
  Maybe “he wants to spend more time with family”?
  - dopamean 7y ago
    This is my favorite excuse in sports because they "retiree" almost always comes back out of retirement which leads me to believe they've had enough time with their family.
    - fishnchips 7y ago
      > they've had enough time with their family As a parent of two very lively small boys, I can say that "enough time with family" is a thing.
      - cloverich 7y ago
        Moreover, "enough time with" anything you don't normally get enough time with can lead a person to change their mind. We're human -- we can re-arrange our priorities but not our time, so we make decisions and are allowed to change our mind. I have no doubts there's more at play here, but a C-level exec leaving for no particular reason after years of grinding seems perfectly reasonable to me.
    - trakter 7y ago
      Nico Rosberg, springs to mind. Not racing again, but he does like to show his face at the races a lot.
      - ryanmercer 7y ago
        IIRC Rick Moranis basically quit acting to be with his family and Elton John has specifically stated he drastically scaled down to raise his children.
      - WillPostForFood 7y ago
        He is working for Sky as a commentator at races. Doing the occasional TV commentary is a lot less time consuming, is a lot less stressful, and allows a lot more family time, than driving for the #1 F1 team, against arguably the best F1 driver off all time in Lewis Hamilton
      - Ididntdothis 7y ago
        I think there is something to it but I think being a driver, especially as Hamilton's teammate, is all-consuming and super stressful. I think now he can do what he wants when he wants without much pressure. He seems to enjoy the spotlight so that's what he does.
    - Ididntdothis 7y ago
      Probably the family had enough of them and kicked them out :-)
    - paulddraper 7y ago
      Urban Meyer 2010 Retires from head football coach at University of Florida. "I know it is time to put my focus on my family and life away from the field." 2011 Becomes the head football coach at Ohio State. --- I say this as a bitter Gators fan.
  - mieseratte 7y ago
    Only to get tired of them two weeks later and suddenly find himself with another CEO spot?
  - duxup 7y ago
    Maybe it is true. "Man I hate this place because ____, and I'd rather spend time with my family." That doesn't preclude wanting to do other things too.
- tomnipotent 7y ago
  > I wish companies Because it's not a soap opera and you're not owed anything about the personal business of other people. As an individual, I have every right to control the narrative for why I've left a company (assuming nothing illegal).
  - hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
    That's my whole point. I fully understand not wanting to air everyone's laundry. I'm just suggesting that nobody is buying their silly lies, so if they think they are "controlling the narrative" they are sorely mistaken.
    - alexbanks 7y ago
      Everyone knowing he's lying is probably a better PR situation than everyone knowing the truth.
      - jonny_eh 7y ago
        It's sad that we tolerate such blatant lies as normal.
        fharper 7y ago
        Can't agree more!
        tomnipotent 7y ago
        You're not tolerating anything, you weren't entitled to know in the first place.
  - pluma 7y ago
    Sure but at a certain point it just harms your credibility if instead of owning up to the incredibly bad mistakes you still pretend you're only leaving because the grass is greener elsewhere. I know it's standard business procedure to outright lie about these things but it becomes farcical when you basically sink an entire company and then get to "resign" and pretend it's not because you did a terrible job.
- paulddraper 7y ago
  What difference would that make?
jeremiahlee 7y ago
Under Bryan Bogensberger's leadership, npm lost: - its CTO - its COO co-founder - some fantastic people in the JavaScript community - a federal labor dispute - its culture - its reputation - its business model to Github
- k__ 7y ago
  Don't know if they lost anything at all to GitHub (yet). But let's see how Entropic and GH package registries turn out.
- smacktoward 7y ago
  "But other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?"
- cpeterso 7y ago
  And he has only been CEO for eight months (January 2019). https://blog.npmjs.org/post/181872197694/npm-inc-has-a-new-ceo-bryan-bogensberger https://blog.npmjs.org/post/181872197694/npm-inc-has-a-new-c...
  - pluma 7y ago
    To be fair, people started leaving last year when the leadership change was first announced internally.
- MrBuddyCasino 7y ago
  They had a business model?
  - koolba 7y ago
    I always assumed their business model was "Stay afloat till $BIG_CORP acquires us".
    - jacurtis 7y ago
      I think that is still the business model. The $7 /mo for enterprise is the "Stay Afloat until..." part of that business model
privateSFacct 7y ago
Story is all about his “success” and desire to seek new opportunities- why not a few sentences about the ongoing labor related litigation.
- draw_down 7y ago
  This is PR, not real life.
- ASalazarMX 7y ago
  It's a press release, not a news article. It only says what NPM Inc. wanted to say, in the way they desired.
- dstaley 7y ago
  I actually think that litigation is no longer ongoing; Kate Conger from the NY Times is reporting that the case was settled. [1] Edit: linked article says the case was settled in June. [2] [1] https://twitter.com/kateconger/status/1175097388253376512 https://twitter.com/kateconger/status/1175097388253376512 [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/08/technology/tech-companies-union-organizing.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/08/technology/tech-companies...
  - fharper 7y ago
    You are right, a settlement has been made.
pnako 7y ago
How many packages is he taking down with him?
- k__ 7y ago
  -1000, I'd guess
Touche 7y ago
"resigned"
asien 7y ago
I’m fascinated by the fact that while node has become a new standard in the industry , and the project is receiving lots of supports from all sorts of companies ( IBM , Microsoft etc...) absolutely no discussion has been opened about how much at risk the JavaScript ecosystem actually is with « npm » and it’s weekly dramas Not a month pass without something going wrong inside of inc, millions of developers are dependant on it but nothing seem to worry people...
- TimothyBJacobs 7y ago
  There has been. CJ Silverio gave a talk on that topic at JSConf this year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO8hZlgK5zc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO8hZlgK5zc See also Entropic as a possible alternative to NPM: https://github.com/entropic-dev/entropic https://github.com/entropic-dev/entropic
  - pluma 7y ago
    For context: Entropic was started by several former npm Inc core developers including CJ who left the company after the CEO change was announced internally. CJ herself is the former CTO of npm Inc. Basically most of the top developers have left the company, others were laid off. It seems to be only a matter of time until none of the people working on npm a year ago remain.
  - tuananh 7y ago
    i doubt entropic will become sth significant. it already lost the momentum it seems.
- humtum 7y ago
  People care. Developers have limited registry options due to lock-in. Creating effective security processes across a massive ecosystem of open source developers is a difficult problem. Registries can't easily create security practices that fit into a heterogenous pool of oss governance and development models. Especially when implementing more rigorous security has the potential to diminish their network effects and developer productivity. Curious to see how npm, GitHub Package Manager, and others address these issues.
cols 7y ago
Looks as if he was asked to leave. No surprise given the terrible optics they've been under for the past year. NPM is such a vital tool and I really enjoy using it. I hope their next CEO makes better decisions in regards to the humans who work there. Good luck to all the NPM staff! I'm rooting for you! From the Register... "According to people familiar with the matter, Bogensberger was asked to leave by the company's board of directors." [0] For more context...from Jonathan Cowperthwait, NPM's former vice president of marketing... "Many of us spent the last year watching our friends and colleagues' struggle through our fingers, but I'm still profoundly confident in the company's ability to turn this around. Sometimes bad executives happen to a good company." [1] [0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/npm_ceo_bryan_bogensbergers_off/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/npm_ceo_bryan_bogen... [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/npm-ceo-bryan-bogensberger-resigns-2019-9 https://www.businessinsider.com/npm-ceo-bryan-bogensberger-r...
- sneak 7y ago
  Why was he asked to leave? To which “terrible optics” do you refer? Your implied context is opaque.
  - cols 7y ago
    If the context is opaque to you then I would encourage you to read the articles and to read the other comments on this thread.
    - sneak 7y ago
      The comment to which I replied is top-level, and has no prior thread context.
    - kanox 7y ago
      As far as I can tell a bunch of people are upset because they got fired - so what? Companies fire people all the time.
      - deleted 7y ago
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Sephr 7y ago
Under Bryan's leadership, multiple namespaces (left-pad, etc.) including my own (file-saver) have been wrongly transferred to new owners without authorization from the previous owners. npm can't handle security, and they have been sorely in need of new leadership for years.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- ulkesh 7y ago
  If only there were other dependency management build tools they could use as good examples to emulate....

137 points by fharper 7y ago

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/npm-inc-announces-leadership-change-300922517.html?tc=eml_cleartime https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/npm-inc-announces-l...

k__ 7y ago

Background: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/02/npm_abandons_settlement_talks/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/02/npm_abandons_settle...

hn_throwaway_99 7y ago

I wish companies would do away with the "leaving to pursue other opportunities" nonsense and just give no reasons if they don't want to discuss it. No C-level exec resigns "effective immediately" without either a transition plan in place or something concrete lined up. I get wanting to allow him to say he resigned instead of he was fired, but the silly language of the press release just makes it worse.

Ididntdothis 7y ago
Maybe “he wants to spend more time with family”?
- dopamean 7y ago
  This is my favorite excuse in sports because they "retiree" almost always comes back out of retirement which leads me to believe they've had enough time with their family.
  - fishnchips 7y ago
    > they've had enough time with their family As a parent of two very lively small boys, I can say that "enough time with family" is a thing.
    - cloverich 7y ago
      Moreover, "enough time with" anything you don't normally get enough time with can lead a person to change their mind. We're human -- we can re-arrange our priorities but not our time, so we make decisions and are allowed to change our mind. I have no doubts there's more at play here, but a C-level exec leaving for no particular reason after years of grinding seems perfectly reasonable to me.
  - trakter 7y ago
    Nico Rosberg, springs to mind. Not racing again, but he does like to show his face at the races a lot.
    - ryanmercer 7y ago
      IIRC Rick Moranis basically quit acting to be with his family and Elton John has specifically stated he drastically scaled down to raise his children.
    - WillPostForFood 7y ago
      He is working for Sky as a commentator at races. Doing the occasional TV commentary is a lot less time consuming, is a lot less stressful, and allows a lot more family time, than driving for the #1 F1 team, against arguably the best F1 driver off all time in Lewis Hamilton
    - Ididntdothis 7y ago
      I think there is something to it but I think being a driver, especially as Hamilton's teammate, is all-consuming and super stressful. I think now he can do what he wants when he wants without much pressure. He seems to enjoy the spotlight so that's what he does.
  - Ididntdothis 7y ago
    Probably the family had enough of them and kicked them out :-)
  - paulddraper 7y ago
    Urban Meyer 2010 Retires from head football coach at University of Florida. "I know it is time to put my focus on my family and life away from the field." 2011 Becomes the head football coach at Ohio State. --- I say this as a bitter Gators fan.
- mieseratte 7y ago
  Only to get tired of them two weeks later and suddenly find himself with another CEO spot?
- duxup 7y ago
  Maybe it is true. "Man I hate this place because ____, and I'd rather spend time with my family." That doesn't preclude wanting to do other things too.
tomnipotent 7y ago
> I wish companies Because it's not a soap opera and you're not owed anything about the personal business of other people. As an individual, I have every right to control the narrative for why I've left a company (assuming nothing illegal).
- hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
  That's my whole point. I fully understand not wanting to air everyone's laundry. I'm just suggesting that nobody is buying their silly lies, so if they think they are "controlling the narrative" they are sorely mistaken.
  - alexbanks 7y ago
    Everyone knowing he's lying is probably a better PR situation than everyone knowing the truth.
    - jonny_eh 7y ago
      It's sad that we tolerate such blatant lies as normal.
      - fharper 7y ago
        Can't agree more!
      - tomnipotent 7y ago
        You're not tolerating anything, you weren't entitled to know in the first place.
- pluma 7y ago
  Sure but at a certain point it just harms your credibility if instead of owning up to the incredibly bad mistakes you still pretend you're only leaving because the grass is greener elsewhere. I know it's standard business procedure to outright lie about these things but it becomes farcical when you basically sink an entire company and then get to "resign" and pretend it's not because you did a terrible job.
paulddraper 7y ago
What difference would that make?

jeremiahlee 7y ago

Under Bryan Bogensberger's leadership, npm lost: - its CTO - its COO co-founder - some fantastic people in the JavaScript community - a federal labor dispute - its culture - its reputation - its business model to Github

k__ 7y ago
Don't know if they lost anything at all to GitHub (yet). But let's see how Entropic and GH package registries turn out.
smacktoward 7y ago
"But other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?"
cpeterso 7y ago
And he has only been CEO for eight months (January 2019). https://blog.npmjs.org/post/181872197694/npm-inc-has-a-new-ceo-bryan-bogensberger https://blog.npmjs.org/post/181872197694/npm-inc-has-a-new-c...
- pluma 7y ago
  To be fair, people started leaving last year when the leadership change was first announced internally.
MrBuddyCasino 7y ago
They had a business model?
- koolba 7y ago
  I always assumed their business model was "Stay afloat till $BIG_CORP acquires us".
  - jacurtis 7y ago
    I think that is still the business model. The $7 /mo for enterprise is the "Stay Afloat until..." part of that business model

privateSFacct 7y ago

Story is all about his “success” and desire to seek new opportunities- why not a few sentences about the ongoing labor related litigation.

draw_down 7y ago
This is PR, not real life.
ASalazarMX 7y ago
It's a press release, not a news article. It only says what NPM Inc. wanted to say, in the way they desired.
dstaley 7y ago
I actually think that litigation is no longer ongoing; Kate Conger from the NY Times is reporting that the case was settled. [1] Edit: linked article says the case was settled in June. [2] [1] https://twitter.com/kateconger/status/1175097388253376512 https://twitter.com/kateconger/status/1175097388253376512 [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/08/technology/tech-companies-union-organizing.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/08/technology/tech-companies...
- fharper 7y ago
  You are right, a settlement has been made.

pnako 7y ago

How many packages is he taking down with him?

k__ 7y ago
-1000, I'd guess

Touche 7y ago

"resigned"

asien 7y ago

I’m fascinated by the fact that while node has become a new standard in the industry , and the project is receiving lots of supports from all sorts of companies ( IBM , Microsoft etc...) absolutely no discussion has been opened about how much at risk the JavaScript ecosystem actually is with « npm » and it’s weekly dramas Not a month pass without something going wrong inside of inc, millions of developers are dependant on it but nothing seem to worry people...

TimothyBJacobs 7y ago
There has been. CJ Silverio gave a talk on that topic at JSConf this year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO8hZlgK5zc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO8hZlgK5zc See also Entropic as a possible alternative to NPM: https://github.com/entropic-dev/entropic https://github.com/entropic-dev/entropic
- pluma 7y ago
  For context: Entropic was started by several former npm Inc core developers including CJ who left the company after the CEO change was announced internally. CJ herself is the former CTO of npm Inc. Basically most of the top developers have left the company, others were laid off. It seems to be only a matter of time until none of the people working on npm a year ago remain.
- tuananh 7y ago
  i doubt entropic will become sth significant. it already lost the momentum it seems.
humtum 7y ago
People care. Developers have limited registry options due to lock-in. Creating effective security processes across a massive ecosystem of open source developers is a difficult problem. Registries can't easily create security practices that fit into a heterogenous pool of oss governance and development models. Especially when implementing more rigorous security has the potential to diminish their network effects and developer productivity. Curious to see how npm, GitHub Package Manager, and others address these issues.

cols 7y ago

Looks as if he was asked to leave. No surprise given the terrible optics they've been under for the past year. NPM is such a vital tool and I really enjoy using it. I hope their next CEO makes better decisions in regards to the humans who work there. Good luck to all the NPM staff! I'm rooting for you! From the Register... "According to people familiar with the matter, Bogensberger was asked to leave by the company's board of directors." [0] For more context...from Jonathan Cowperthwait, NPM's former vice president of marketing... "Many of us spent the last year watching our friends and colleagues' struggle through our fingers, but I'm still profoundly confident in the company's ability to turn this around. Sometimes bad executives happen to a good company." [1] [0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/npm_ceo_bryan_bogensbergers_off/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/20/npm_ceo_bryan_bogen... [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/npm-ceo-bryan-bogensberger-resigns-2019-9 https://www.businessinsider.com/npm-ceo-bryan-bogensberger-r...

sneak 7y ago
Why was he asked to leave? To which “terrible optics” do you refer? Your implied context is opaque.
- cols 7y ago
  If the context is opaque to you then I would encourage you to read the articles and to read the other comments on this thread.
  - sneak 7y ago
    The comment to which I replied is top-level, and has no prior thread context.
  - kanox 7y ago
    As far as I can tell a bunch of people are upset because they got fired - so what? Companies fire people all the time.
    - deleted 7y ago

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Sephr 7y ago

Under Bryan's leadership, multiple namespaces (left-pad, etc.) including my own (file-saver) have been wrongly transferred to new owners without authorization from the previous owners. npm can't handle security, and they have been sorely in need of new leadership for years.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ulkesh 7y ago
If only there were other dependency management build tools they could use as good examples to emulate....