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I worked for Advanced Network and Services, which operated the NSFNET and was later acquired by America Online. Then one day the company was acquired by WorldCo
by siskiyou 3mo ago
I worked for Advanced Network and Services, which operated the NSFNET and was later acquired by America Online. Then one day the company was acquired by WorldCom. A few years later the CEO was sentenced to 25 years in prison for a ~$10 billion fraud. As a systems administrator I knew nothing about any of that, but I could tell that the new management included a lot of players and empire builders. That's the signal that told me to quit a few months after the acquisition. Employees were invited to invest their retirement savings in a mutual fund that contained only WorldCom stock. Many of them lost everything. Pay attention to those signals.
- sokoloff 3mo agoI feel like Worldcom got a modest amount of press coverage at the time but probably would have gotten a lot more if it hadn’t been front-run by the Enron scandal.
- adastra22 3mo agoWhy are these always one letter off from what they actually are? Worldcom-> World-con. Madoff -> Made-off
- N_Lens 3mo agoPalantir are upfront!
- inigyou 3mo agoScam Bankrun-Fraud
- hyperadvanced 3mo agoNormative determinism is the term for that
- pinkmuffinere 3mo ago*Nominative Determinism. Named after John Nominative, who first proposed the effect.
- hyperadvanced 3mo agoMy phone must have autocorrected. Ty and good joke :)
- GJim 3mo ago> Employees were invited to invest their retirement savings in a mutual fund that contained only WorldCom stock. Investing in your own employer is an idiotic risk..... If the company goes titsup, then you lose your job and your savings. This happened to many people during the dotcom crash.
- siskiyou 3mo agoFor decades after my WorldCom experience, I cashed out all equity grants immediately and invested the money elsewhere. Even if the company appears solid and is not run by criminals, it's still sound risk management. Bad things can happen to good companies as well.
- Npovview 3mo agoOne more example to know if Company is about to go under is when the finance folks who have access to accounting books are leaving the company.