These are my thoughts on the matter:
I applaud the employees that pushed back and have spoken out. You guys/gals Rock!! Thank you so dang much!!!
To Andy Yen, you obviously have no flipping clue who your actual customers are. Your views are incompatible with what I thought Proton was. I don't care how inconsequential of a decision you thought it was. That attitude over anything, especially security!?, is the exact opposite of what I thought Proton was when I signed up in 2020. I especially did not expect something like this when I became a buisness level subscriber in 2022. For me to continue using the services of Proton, you need to resign from Proton in any and all capacity.
Furthermore to Proton as an entity. Any and all who shared in this kind of mentality and disregard needs to be scrutinized and removed if necessary. Don't be crazy about it, but you know who NEEDS to go I think.
Look, we all are seeing that AI is here to stay. And it has gotten incredible at coding if I am to believe what I have read. The world is abruptly changing, but that is why now more that ever we need you to move as securely as you possibly can. Yes that still means using every tool at your disposal, but with the utmost concern and scrutiny supporting security and privacy. Even the crazy conspiracy/science fiction would never happen stuff, we're counting on you guys not being susceptible to it. We want privacy and security, not features and shinn-shi-curity.
If that is not the company Proton is striving to be, I will be taking my business elsewhere. I expect many others will be doing so as well. Imagine the fash.crud on top of all this. Don't know why I was sticking around truthfully.
Wow, there are 18 pages of 20 comments per, all made in less than 48 hours, all with the same conclusion.
Damage control on this is going to have to be fast and decisive or it may kill the company rather abruptly.
Even if you aren't considering leaving because of the AI use, the push to rush implementation at the cost of quality testing, or the abusive behavior of Andy Yen toward his employees, you should still be making plans to migrate because this situation could end with Proton collapsing.
Long-term subscribers are leaving. Businesses that have been paying for reliability and stability with Proton are re-evaluating their contracts. If the company leadership doesn't respond adequately very quickly, they're going to hemorrhage users and then hemorrhage money, and then their assets start going on sale.
Outside of the fediverse and the magazines reporting on this, I doubt it will impact Proton that much. If they actually make the CEO step down, they'd need someone with a focus on community and Doing The Right Thing, whatever that means in practice. Maybe a social contract, Debian style?
I'd argue these are the places Proton subscribers found out about Proton and became convinced to trust it.
If the board acts swiftly and decisively with absolute transparency this could be just a "small" bump to a healthier and more trust worthy company on the other side. There can't be any more BS from them though. Are they a privacy company or a profit company? They need to pick now and fucking prove it if they want to be a security company.
For those who aren't already aware: Proton AG (all of their services like Mail, VPN, etc) is a for-profit company, while the non-profit Proton Foundation retains majority ownership.
It's the same structure that Mozilla uses.
I also see a possible path forward, this "bump" being what sets the course. I am a paying Proton subscriber, and the important thing for me is how this gets resolved. What they learn. If they say "this or that feature won't be implemented any time soon, we're going to focus on QA and cleaning up our repos for a while" then that is exactly the type of thing that I'm willing to pay for, for example.
Yep, if Proton plays its cards well, this could be a positive thing in the end. If they dump Yen quickly enough and replace him with someone who doesn't suffer late-stage AI psychosis, it could be seen as a sign that even a brainrotten CEO can't sink this ship because corporate culture is strong enough to fix things like that.
And I do not think Yen has as much staying power as the "usual suspects" in the AI frenzy.
This is the reason we shouldn't have bosses. If 99% oft a company disagrees with a tactic that the CEO wants, one person can destroy everything. It's statistically speaking likely a more narcisstic/psychopathic person at the top.
We need workers cooperatives instead, where decisions are met based on consensus of employees
Something like that, yes. Need to figure out a way so people who know what they're talking about have a voice.
If simple majority at my job made decisions, they'd still be editing python2 directly in production.
That's where concepts like rational authority come in handy.
For example:
the coop votes on who is in what role. People explain their education, credentials, or experience, and the coop determines who should have authority over which roles. They are then responsible for the choices pertinent to that role because they are likely the most qualified to decide them.
If somebody disagrees with the role holder's decisions then they can challenge it and get the coop to vote on it, but that causes a lot of tension and scrutiny so you'd have to be sure you're challenging for legitimate reason lest you make a fool of yourself. Generally the role holder is left to make decisions because the coop has entrusted them to do so, and they're likely the best person for that role. But it also allows accountability if they make poor decisions.
Right. I think there's an unavoidable risk in that someone's political skills can carry them further than their practical skills would justify. Like I've known a lot of people at work who make solid engineering decisions, but aren't as well liked as the suck ups.
Damn right!
I don't think it's that serious for them.
I guarantee 95% of their revenue base is unaware of this.
Of the remaining 5%, the number that will actually cancel will be tiny.
All they have to do is not do any additional fuckups for a few weeks.
95% of their user base is probably free accounts. Us users serious enough to pay are watching much closer and mean more to their bottom line
I think so too - people who pay for Protons services are keenly aware of such situations, because these things are the reason they signed up with Proton in the first place.
Noone cares much if the free account users switch, but the paying fractions opinion (like me) will have significant weight.
2 ways forward: go with Yen and observe Protons decay (which will also help physics!), or dump him and show the people that actually pay for the services that you still care.
I said revenue base, not user.
All these comments are on Proton's customer service website, not some random social media. And this discussion has more interaction than any of the other discussions there, in a very short time. That's a lot of attention in a hurry, all from Proton's userbase.