u/INTERNET_POLICE_MAN wrote (the comment Michael replied to):
## History so far: - In 2009, Novati joined Facebook as a software engineer, progressing rapidly to the level of Principal Engineer (E7). He has publicly recounted a story about a game of Risk in which he deliberately betrayed Mark Zuckerberg, framing it as an example of “strateg
u/michaelnovati replied · ★ FEATURED
PART 5
* Prospective students withdrew applications after encountering the negative threads on Reddit.
* Codesmith’s revenue declined by approximately eighty percent, with about half of that attributed directly to the sustained Reddit campaign.
I can't comment on the number of applications because I don't know the exact numbers, but I'm curious how many this actually is.
The article grossly overstates the impact of Reddit on their funnel and understates the impact of the market. Their main competitor entirely shut down and their other main competitor is scaling back. For all I know all the talk about Codesmith kept their numbers UP when they would have shut down otherwsie.
* The company’s headcount fell from seventy to fifteen employees.
I believe this is true and the entire industry has experienced huge layoffs of similar magnitudes - and entire shutdowns.
* Founder and former Chief Executive Officer Will Sentance resigned, citing personal toll and self-doubt following the continuous online attacks.
He never once cited that personal toll publicly. All of the public statements indicate that he was focusing on teaching instead of running the operations of the company because he wanted to do that more.
* After his resignation, Novati continued posting about Sentance, including comments concerning his academic fellowship at Oxford.
I don't remember commenting critically about his fellowship. Do you have the source?
* Former Codesmith instructors and students stated publicly that they distanced themselves from the organisation due to the hostile environment created by the Reddit activity.
The ones I talk to are distancing themselves because of Codesmith's lack of adaptiveness to a collapsing job market. They don't feel comfortable telling people to go to any bootcamp in this market.
* Founders of competing bootcamps, including Tech Elevator and App Academy, have publicly described Codesmith as a reputable and high-performing programme. The endorsement of direct competitors further contradicts Novati’s claims.
Codesmith is a reputable program yeah. I said that many times in my commentary. That doesn't mean there's more to it than that