<story><title>Homicide victim found in burnt-out SUV ID&apos;d as man behind spam-email empire</title><url>https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/davis-wolfgang-hawke-missing-dead-1.5782107</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>skizziepop</author><text>What or where is &amp;quot;S.A.&amp;quot; ?</text></item><item><author>clueless123</author><text>Over here in S.A. there is a common saying: Behind every fortune there is a crime.  I guess it is pretty international after all.</text></item><item><author>Judgmentality</author><text>I mean, AirBnB got off to a similar start.  Before they brought on the infamous spammer as a cofounder it was basically failing to gain any traction, and then he broke the craiglist TOS to scrape their listings.&lt;p&gt;Yes, there is more to the story, but I don&amp;#x27;t see how AirBnB could&amp;#x27;ve ever become what it is today (even if it&amp;#x27;s doing poorly now because of covid and other factors) without some unethical &amp;quot;growth hacking.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;In my experience, very few successful tech founders are what I would consider admirable people (obviously anecdotal and subjective).  In addition to people like Zuckerberg, Silicon Valley attracts straight up con (wo)men like Adam Neumann and Elizabeth Holmes.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cnbc.com&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;01&amp;#x2F;26&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founder-nathan-blecharczyk-spam-pioneer-says-book.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cnbc.com&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;01&amp;#x2F;26&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founder-nathan-ble...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founders-freshman-roommate-says-hes-a-spammy-scumbag-2011-10&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founders-freshman-...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>ojnabieoot</author><text>I think calling an email spammer a technologist, and a technological risk-taker, is a bit much - as is the comparison to McAfee. Maybe in temperament but nowhere close in ability or accomplishment. Hawke was just a con artist with some computer skills.</text></item><item><author>daenz</author><text>What a colorful life: a jewish chess prodigy who becomes a notorious neo-nazi and email spammer, ruffles a lot of feathers as a con man, turns into a nomad and travels under the radar around North America, finally shot to death and found in a burning SUV.&lt;p&gt;There seems to be a specific rare phenotype for these tech high-risk takers (thinking of John McAfee also).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>hanniabu</author><text>I love how there&amp;#x27;s currently 5 comments and they each have a different answer for what it stands for. Let that be a lesson on explicit vs implicit</text></comment>
<story><title>Homicide victim found in burnt-out SUV ID&apos;d as man behind spam-email empire</title><url>https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/davis-wolfgang-hawke-missing-dead-1.5782107</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>skizziepop</author><text>What or where is &amp;quot;S.A.&amp;quot; ?</text></item><item><author>clueless123</author><text>Over here in S.A. there is a common saying: Behind every fortune there is a crime.  I guess it is pretty international after all.</text></item><item><author>Judgmentality</author><text>I mean, AirBnB got off to a similar start.  Before they brought on the infamous spammer as a cofounder it was basically failing to gain any traction, and then he broke the craiglist TOS to scrape their listings.&lt;p&gt;Yes, there is more to the story, but I don&amp;#x27;t see how AirBnB could&amp;#x27;ve ever become what it is today (even if it&amp;#x27;s doing poorly now because of covid and other factors) without some unethical &amp;quot;growth hacking.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;In my experience, very few successful tech founders are what I would consider admirable people (obviously anecdotal and subjective).  In addition to people like Zuckerberg, Silicon Valley attracts straight up con (wo)men like Adam Neumann and Elizabeth Holmes.&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cnbc.com&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;01&amp;#x2F;26&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founder-nathan-blecharczyk-spam-pioneer-says-book.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cnbc.com&amp;#x2F;2017&amp;#x2F;01&amp;#x2F;26&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founder-nathan-ble...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founders-freshman-roommate-says-hes-a-spammy-scumbag-2011-10&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.businessinsider.com&amp;#x2F;airbnb-co-founders-freshman-...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>ojnabieoot</author><text>I think calling an email spammer a technologist, and a technological risk-taker, is a bit much - as is the comparison to McAfee. Maybe in temperament but nowhere close in ability or accomplishment. Hawke was just a con artist with some computer skills.</text></item><item><author>daenz</author><text>What a colorful life: a jewish chess prodigy who becomes a notorious neo-nazi and email spammer, ruffles a lot of feathers as a con man, turns into a nomad and travels under the radar around North America, finally shot to death and found in a burning SUV.&lt;p&gt;There seems to be a specific rare phenotype for these tech high-risk takers (thinking of John McAfee also).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Tarq0n</author><text>South Africa, the southernmost country on the African continent.</text></comment>