Comment by ChrisMarshallNY

CEOs get very invested in their projects. It's pretty much expected. It's their entire life. Many of them have invested everything into their companies, and are terrified of failures (there's an awful lot of FAIL out there).

Different Principals have different ways of evaluating threats, and reacting to them. At first glance, this seems like an awful mistake, on the part of the Replit people (Can you say "own goal"? I knew you could!).

Maybe there's more to the tale than appears here, but it does seem fairly straightforward; assuming that the emails shared tell the whole story.

I hope that everyone finds a way past this, and comes out OK.

One thing that I will say, is that the OP seems to be pretty sharp. He's young, and maybe he reacted more quickly and naively than a cynical old bastard like Yours Truly would, but he has done a pretty cool job on his project. It might not be "ship-ready," but it sounds like a great demonstration of his capabilities.

Also, as Elon Musk shows, CEOs can cause tremendous damage, if they go off-script. Being a CEO of a public/funded company is a fairly awesome Responsibility. It needs to be taken seriously.

I'd say that this very thread shows the damage that can be done to the company. Having this pinned at #1 on HN for all this time is devastating. It's actually kind of horrifying. Like watching a slow-motion train wreck. A lot of Replit employees and VCs are going to take it in the shorts from this. He's probably got some 'splainin' to do...

I can't remember the company, but there's a famous object lesson of a UK CEO that destroyed his life's work and corporation, by mentioning an upcoming product too early.