Brianna Wu - A primer for journalists - Helping to hold politicians accountable, at least if they're also lolcows.

[Norvic]

As requested by @Peace and Harmony I'm starting a new thread on this.

From the general thread:

Yo guys, I'm starting a primer for journalists about Wu's political campaign on the wiki. I want to keep it brief, just a couple of paragraphs on the most important points we'd like people to know about Wu, 'cos the threads and the wiki tend to be pretty sprawling and cover a lot of gossip and other stuff that's totally irrelevant to most people in the real world. My hope is that when it's done we can pin it to the top of the Wu article and all the Wu threads for the duration of her campaign in case people come by looking for info on the real Brianna Wu.

I listed the four points I think it's probably most important to cover. If anyone thinks there's anything else that needs to be added, or something that should be left out, then I'm all ears.

There's a bunch of subsequent discussion there, but we should probably keep any future stuff to this thread.

Since I wrote that, I've made a start on fleshing out the first section. I want to keep the whole article down to about a five minute read, so there won't be much more. I want to add just 3 or 4 more sentences outlining Wu's lack of understanding of technology matters within congress and how ludicrous her statements on cybersecurity have been. I'm pretty tired now, so that will probably have to wait until tomorrow. As always, comments welcome and especially hints on how to fill in the TODO's I've left in the article. (I write code like that too, I bet you wish you worked with me )

 

[Prussian Blue]

Doing the Lords work my man.

My only wish is for it to be hosted elsewhere. I know a lot of people who will see lolcow wiki and instantly dismiss it.

 

[Peace and Harmony]

My thoughts exactly, the first thing is to have a bit of a game plan where people might (a) actually see it and (b) not immediately dismiss it as alt-right rape threats.

 

[Dimethyl Ketone]

How about on a neutral "general interest" wiki site? http://www.wikia.com/Special:CreateNewWiki

Can give it any neutral name and you'll be search-engined indexed for free too.

 

[DumbDosh]

You could just publish it on Medium as a general posting site.

 

[Norvic]

Eh, I don't think any of that is necessary. One, because political commentators who are the primary intended audience for this aren't internet denizens in the same way that the Paste and Bustle types who have covered Wu up until now are. They don't come to the lolcow wiki with the same perception as the more internet savvy. Two, because KF and the lolcow wiki already have a reasonable google ranking for Wu information. The point is to supply information to people at a place they're likely to come when searching for info about Wu.

Edit: What I will do though is register a domain name when it's done to point at the page so anyone who wants to cite it on social media or whatever has a short, punchy domain to paste.

 

[theCWCandtheDead]

Be sure to mention the absolute failure of the Giant Spacekat company.
Wu talks about at it as if it some gaming empire, when in reality it never turned any profit and released one 1 game only. Losing hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Please also mention that the most influential Woman in Tech's company was ENTIRELY financed by her husband and Wu hasn't had a job/ any income other than Patreon in years.

 

[Kosher Dill]

Please also mention that the most influential Woman in Tech's company was ENTIRELY financed by her husband

Disagree on this. Plenty of normal couples (even ones including die-hard feminists) have one "dreamer" and one "earner", this could easily come off to the uninitiated as unnecessarily petty.

Anyway, more thoughts - I'd reword the opening statement; we don't need to fall over ourselves apologizing for ourselves. How about something like: "The public life and political candidacy of Brianna Wu are surrounded by a perpetual maelstrom of rumor, gossip, spin, and outright fabrication. This page was created to help interested observers separate the facts from the fictions that so easily spring up in this post-truth political moment." Or something along those lines.

Also, the stuff about "dev-ops" is something no normie will understand or care about, it might be best to simplify or omit that.

 

[Kroster]

Disagree on this. Plenty of normal couples (even ones including die-hard feminists) have one "dreamer" and one "earner", this could easily come off to the uninitiated as unnecessarily petty.

Agree. It takes money to start a company. Most entrepreneurs get that money from their parents or their spouse. That's not the snarkable part of Wu's career failures.

Also, the stuff about "dev-ops" is something no normie will understand or care about, it might be best to simplify or omit that.

Disagree. I'm a normie and that detail was good.

 

[Slap47]

I was hoping that we'd endorse her and help her win...

 

[ZKWNordman]

Be sure to mention the absolute failure of the Giant Spacekat company.
Wu talks about at it as if it some gaming empire, when in reality it never turned any profit and released one 1 game only. Losing hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Please also mention that the most influential Woman in Tech's company was ENTIRELY financed by her husband and Wu hasn't had a job/ any income other than Patreon in years.

Giant Spacekatgal also illustrates how her one provable “experience” in software is a sham. The person who actually coded the game is actually on record as saying she did the code. Frank is even on record as saying he did all of the art except for Brianna’s characters. Amanda is on record as having animated everything.

Brianna had an idea, wrote a story, and then paid people to do all of the work while she called herself CEO and played on Twitter all day bragging about her endless workdays.

The end result? Half a million dollars of debt. No profit.

 

[Yellow Yam Scam]

Eh, I don't think any of that is necessary. One, because political commentators who are the primary intended audience for this aren't internet denizens in the same way that the Paste and Bustle types who have covered Wu up until now are. They don't come to the lolcow wiki with the same perception as the more internet savvy. Two, because KF and the lolcow wiki already have a reasonable google ranking for Wu information. The point is to supply information to people at a place they're likely to come when searching for info about Wu.

Edit: What I will do though is register a domain name when it's done to point at the page so anyone who wants to cite it on social media or whatever has a short, punchy domain to paste.

What's the point of having them find the site via google if they disregard what's on it? You don't have to be an internet nerd to know not to trust off-brand wiki sites.

 

[polonium]

What's the point of having them find the site via google if they disregard what's on it? You don't have to be an internet nerd to know not to trust off-brand wiki sites.

Yeah, journos are also not exactly straining at the leash to do actual work. They're not even googling, they're going straight to wikipedia to pull two or three things that look like they might be facts to stick in their piece or drop in as context questions in an interview.

 

[Puppet Pal Clem]

Still don't see any real need.
He doesn't even pose enough of a threat to warrant an expose of his character.
John will lose and get bored and quit and move on to whatever his next hobby is whilst claiming to be an expert political campaign runner.

If you want a credible article to accurately destroy him, you're better off personally hunting down a writer with a reputation for it and tempting them to do it.
It's not going to be somebody beholden to a mainstream outlet. You want a weirdo like us who revels in observing crazy people, but also sane enough not to have some sort of public or activist identity.

 

[Dimethyl Ketone]

Still don't see any real need.
He doesn't even pose enough of a threat to warrant an expose of his character.
John will lose and get bored and quit and move on to whatever his next hobby is whilst claiming to be an expert political campaign runner.

If you want a credible article to accurately destroy him, you're better off personally hunting down a writer with a reputation for it and tempting them to do it.
It's not going to be somebody beholden to a mainstream outlet. You want a weirdo like us who revels in observing crazy people, but also sane enough not to have some sort of public or activist identity.

I think that's looking only to the present and not the future -- obviously this whole race is a sham to stay relevant and continue to roll in the patreon bux with additional exposure / "credibility". If we can have a simple exposé that folks can find on a neutral platform.. I think we can make this multi-year donation buildup scam into a bust.

 

[Coccxys]

I don't know, I think you're getting a little too invested in this cow. I prefer to just sit back, just let events happen around them and laugh at the strange shit they do. Nothing done by us (or anyone else) to try and interfere directly ever results in anything as funny as will happen organically. Cows are cows because of how they act, not because of how they react to people trying to get a reaction.

If we are intent on interfering my vote is for doing all we can to get her elected. Think of it as an investment, nothing that will occur due to her losing will be as funny as what it'll be like if she gets elected.

 

[Dimethyl Ketone]

@Kosher Dill 's latest post in the John Walker general dedicated shitpost thread...

- The government stays almost completely out of the employer-employee relationship, allowing GSK to hire and fire Craigslist coders at-will on whatever arbitrary terms they can negotiate.

I was thinking about minimum wage in relation to this.. I was going to write a reply there elaborating how what is quoted is not quite true, however a lightbulb shot off in my head...

In the USA, you cannot pay an employee less than minimum wage, even by mutual agreement. There are a few corner-cases, such as:

1. An internship. In this case the worker is not an employee, but rather it is considerd "training/education". States vary on what defines an internship.
2. Volunteer work (which is no pay)
3. Supplemented Wage (like waitors/waitresses) - if total amount taken in exceeds the minimum wage, for example from tips, then that is counted as part of their pay. If, however, the amount taken in from tips and the sub-wage pay does not meet minimum wage per hour, that employee is entitled to the difference
4. Self-employeed

Even if a person agrees to work for sub-minimum, the employer is still breaking the law and can be taken to court.

Now, I'm missing some information here in regards to Giant Space Kat's contracts, but I seem to remember the job posting's on CL stating rates of just $1 total...


Sure, maybe they managed to work some sort of loophole to be counted into one of the above groups.. such as telling the workers to incorporate themselves, and thus they would be self-employeed and Wu would be paying their shell-corps.
They could have been sold into doing this with offers like "Oh, you will receive a portion of the $$$ when this AAA-title revolutionizes [teehee] the gaming industry."
I really doubt they broke the law blatently, maybe you could hide from the government with mutual agreement, but with the failure that is GSK, I think any employee would have sued if they were able.

The part of interest and the lightbulb moment for me here is that MA district 8 is a working-class region.
I'm sure local voters (and thus journalists) would be berry intwested in GSK's Human Exploitment Department.


EDIT: Rewrote portions to be clearer

 

[Kosher Dill]

Now, I'm missing some information here in regards to Giant Space Kat's contracts, but I seem to remember the job posting's on CL stating rates of just $1 total

All this means is that they set up the contract to leave no record of the exact pay rate, and let GSK change the pay at-will. There's no evidence that they actually paid a sub-minimum wage at any point.

 

[Dimethyl Ketone]

All this means is that they set up the contract to leave no record of the exact pay rate

Right, hiding it because it wasn't a fair deal. ITT we're aiming at journalists who are aiming at readers, we aren't filing a lawsuit. So maybe some additional research is needed, maybe not. I could see the headline now, "Did Brianna Wu, D running for MA 8 pay workers just $1 before bankrupting the company?" The tax records for GSK should show this... my personal guess is that it was some sort of profit-sharing arrangement, and BriBri bankrupting the company made this amount to exactly $1 and no more with no entity left to even sue. Aka, worker exploitation.

 

[ZKWNordman]

Right, hiding it because it wasn't a fair deal. ITT we're aiming at journalists who are aiming at readers, we aren't filing a lawsuit. So maybe some additional research is needed, maybe not. I could see the headline now, "Did Brianna Wu, D running for MA 8 pay workers just $1 before bankrupting the company?" The tax records for GSK should show this... my personal guess is that it was some sort of profit-sharing arrangement, and BriBri bankrupting the company made this amount to exactly $1 and no more with no entity left to even sue. Aka, worker exploitation.

You would think and hope that journalists would care about her lies, but so far they don’t. She blasts everyone for lacking diversity in their companies while flat out lying about hiring minorities. She claims to offer competitive pay and benefits, but the truth is she paid her team one dollar for doing all of the work on her game.

It’s even documented that she pays Warren $1000 a quarter, and she doesn’t allow him to expense gas even though he’s driving around the district every day. He has to beg for gas money and shoes on Facebook.

$1000 per quarter doesn’t even work out to a measly &100 per week.

Brianna has learned that if you lie boldly, people will believe you.

@Norvic - it might be worth documenting Warren’s low pay if you’re planning on writing something up on Wu’s claims and economic policy.