"How the fuck does something like this happen?" "How does an elephant just die?" "He was very old and depressed." "He'd recently been rescued from the circus, but as it turns out, he actually really loved performing." "Who gives a fuck about the elephant?" "What about me?" "This does not look good." "I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out how to remove him." "He weighs 9,000 pounds." "Cut it up." "Take it out in pieces." "I..." "I don't mean to interrupt, but... but I could call in a personal favor and get a helo crew out of Travis AFB with a Sikorsky Skycrane to airlift it out and drop it in the ocean right after dark." "No muss, no fuss." "There." "Was that so hard, Patrice?" "Because Hoover sure didn't think so." "I mean, I just found my footing again, and you put me in danger of losing it all over some fucking elephant?" "Gavin, you always said that here at Hooli, "In order to achieve greatness, we must first achieve goodness."" "Right." "So?" "So..." "I was a bridesmaid at Sean Parker's wedding when he handed out live bunnies as plush toys." "That wasn't goodness." "It was badness." "And so is this." "You're using endangered animals just to make points at board meetings." "I'm drawing thoughtful, zoological comparisons." "But couldn't you just show them a picture of these animals?" "A simple Hooli search would yield thousands of choices." "Patrice, I thank you for your honesty, and I will repay you with my own." "I honestly never want to see you in my offices again." "You're fired." "Hoover?" " Scramble that Skycrane." " Yes, sir." "Please... come in." "Come in." "Have a seat." "I won't take a lot of your time." "I promise." "Okay." "Would you like some tea?" "I can put a kettle on the hot plate." "Oh, no, I'm fine." "Thank you." "There's no trouble." "You know what?" "I have a box of... of Russell Stover's if the spiders didn't get into 'em." "Jared, is this about the fake users?" "You know?" "Two days ago, I wanted to look at user behavior to figure out what spurred the sudden uptick, and... well, I noticed something." "Almost all of our new users were just uploading a single photo into a shared folder, and then the next day, they would take the photo out and then put it back in the day after that and that's it." "You know, just enough to qualify as a daily active user." "Classic click-farm behavior." "And then I remembered our conversation in the bathtub, and it just... it had to be you." "Richard, I am so sorry." "It's okay." " Would it make you feel better to... to strike me?" " No." "You... you had good intentions, Jared." "Honestly, don't give it another thought." "Just, you know... you and I right now are the only ones that know about it." "Okay?" "And in a few weeks, when we run out of money, this will all be over anyway." " Richard?" " Yes?" "We have a secret." "Yeah." "I mean, I swear to God, your dicks would have blown out of the back of your assholes if you had been there, hand to God." "Hey, guys." "What's going on?" "Richard, sit down." "I did it." "I saved the company." "What do you..." "What?" "How?" "Jared, have you been crying?" "Yes, but for ordinary reasons." " Please, go on." " Okay." "I was at The Rosewood for lunch." "I mean, it was the lunch hour." "I was there, I wasn't eating, the usual." "So, I walk over to Andreessen and I say something funny, but he stone-faces me." "What did you say?" "It doesn't matter." "The point is, it was hilarious, but he gave me nothing and neither did his friends." "Then I realized why." "You're not funny?" "No, Gilfoyle, but that is." "No, it's that everybody thinks" "Pied Piper is in this death spiral, so it would be inappropriate to laugh at my hysterical joke." "And it hits me." "I know something that they don't." "I know about the uptick." "The uptick?" "Yes, the uptick!" "The recent sudden surge in users." "Yeah." "That." "Yes, that." "So, while our fortune is rising, everybody else thinks that it's plummeting, and I can use these opposing forces to a multiplying effect like a slingshot, and then I make a decision." "I'm gonna make a move." "So, I say something cryptic about the uptick, and I walk away." " What did you say?" " I don't know." "I can't remember." "But I walk over and I see McNamee's having the short rib, which I hear is delicious but not too heavy, and then I say to him," ""You're gonna have to tuck in your tie-dye if you want to eat here."" " How's that relevant?" " It's not." "But the people that I just walked away from don't know that." "All they know is that I'm over there exchanging witty banter with McNamee, and about what, they don't know." "It's all that they do want to know." "And then, it settles in." "F.O.M.O." "The fear of missing out." "Suddenly, it feels like time is slowing down." "I could see every move I was going to make 12 steps ahead." "It was like I was Bobby Fischer if he could really fuck." "I go outside, I walk across the street to Graylock, I check in on Instagram," "Vinod Khosla calls me, asks me what I doing there." "I say, "I can't talk right now." "Call me at Wood Opal."" "Well, he does, and then suddenly Wood Opal is going," ""What's Khosla got going on with Bachman?"" "Meanwhile, I'm taking a leak at a Restoration Hardware." "I jack off a little bit." "I don't cum." "And then it snowballs." "I deftly played Ross Loma against Index Ventures." "And because of that, the big kahuna bites." "Sequoia." "I spend the next 20 minutes denying calls from Jim Goetz, over and over." "And yes, I'm jacking off, but I don't need to ejaculate because by the time I listen to the messages," "I've got offers, I've got counters," "I've got counter-counters." "I cum." "When the dust settled... and the losers went home, all that was left was this." ""Hello, Mr. Bachman." ""Coleman Blair Partners would like to offer Pied Piper" ""a Series B round of $6 million on a $60 million valuation."" "Yeah!" "Holy shit." "And this asshole wanted to pivot to video chat." "Still valid." "Although less sexy now." "I'll concede that." "It's my Mona Lisa." "And the entire cornerstone upon which I built this motherfucking cathedral that I will forever be remembered for, was this beautiful..." "little uptick." "I think I have a bottle of Cold Duck in the crisper." "Who's drinking?" "Come on!" "I got a bottle of Martinelli's for you, Jared." "This is a big day!" "We did it!" "Yes!" " Are there any wine coolers?" " I'll talk to him." "I..." "I'll talk to him." "Here's my Hooli badge." "And I have a hanging tag on my rear-view mirror for the parking structure." "Can I just mail that in?" "No, you need to go get that now." "Okay." "Hey, Dinesh." "I'm just..." "looking for Erlich." "Have you seen him?" "Oh, he went to the liquor store." "Gotta keep the party going, you know?" "Oh, yeah." "Yeah, Series B. Crazy, right?" " Oh, it's unreal." " Yeah." "Almost like some of our users." "What?" "What... what does that mean?" "Oh, "unreal" has so many meanings." ""Fake," "paid for,"" ""one person in Bangladesh pretending to be 6,000."" "Okay." "All right, Dinesh..." "Oh, no." "I don't want to know a fucking thing." "Okay then." "Great." "I won't tell you anything because nothing happened." "Great." "Okay." "But if something did happen, and we're not saying it did, the fact remains that leaves us in a very advantageous position." "There's a lot of money on the table." "And it would be a shame if that went away." "You know what else would be a shame... is if I couldn't find my flash drive." "Gilfoyle, have you seen my flash drive?" "Right, the one with the zombie script on it?" "Why yes, the zombie script that randomizes user action in platforms such as Pied Piper." "You mean so that fake users and click farms would be absolutely indistinguishable from real users?" "Oh, I suppose." "I mean, especially during due diligence, like the kind done by VCs or possible future reviews done by certain regulatory bodies." "It also had photos of my auntie." "Anyway, Gilfoyle, have you seen it?" "I have not." "Well, Richard, keep an eye out for it, will ya?" "Hey, Gilfoyle, you wanna come inside and help me" " Yeah, I think we're sort of done with the ruse." " Okay." "Okay, fine." "Well, whatever you did or didn't do, that was serial-killer-level shit." "Agreed." "I think I finally respect you as a CEO." "Fuck." "This is fraud." "Is it?" "I mean, our... our platform does exactly what we say it does." "Okay?" "It's not like we're lying about it like fucking Theranos." "And if our platform works, which we know it will, we will make them billions of dollars." "Everybody wins, Jared." "You still believe that, right?" "That, if given enough time, the platform will catch on?" "Richard, don't weaponize my faith in you against me." "Your faith made all this possible." "It's wrong." "Well, every time I try to do the right thing, I get fucked." "And if I do the right thing here, we're done." "That's it." "Doesn't seem like much of an option, does it?" "Deng, they're all just so good." "Gavin, CJ Cantwell, line one." "Deng, let's pick this up tomorrow." "CJ." "I'm finishing a story I'd love a comment on." "It's about the death of an unpermitted Indian elephant named Maurice in your sculpture garden and its subsequent illegal dumping in the San Francisco Bay." "That's preposterous." "I have a very good source." "What do you propose we do here?" "Well, I have one idea." "And what, pray tell, might that be?" "CJ sold the blog for $2 million." "No shit." "Bachmanity rides again." "Well, not exactly." "I called Big Head to tell him that our share was worth half a mil each, and... not five minutes later, his father, one Nelson Bighetti, Sr., called me and explained that I was never to have" "any financial dealings with his son in perpetuity... ever or he would get very Italian on me." "And I'm not interested to find out what that means." "Okay." "Shall we?" "To Coleman Blair!" "Let's close this fucker." "Good luck, fellas." "Remember, you just sit there and look pretty." "Leave all the talking to me." "And if you mention my Montblanc, then... don't make it overt, like I told you to." "But do." "Hey, what's up?" "Are you guys out raising money from someone else?" "Monica, it's... it's kind of a long story." "Why are you whispering?" "Oh, my God, you're there right now, aren't you?" "Jesus!" "Do you have any idea how big of an asshole you're making me look here?" "Laurie just lost her shit at me, okay?" "So, you need to turn around and walk the hell out of there." "Erlich put all this together." "I really had nothing to do with it." "You have everything to do with it." "You're the fucking CEO, Richard!" "Whatever your company does is 100% on you!" "Gentlemen." "They're ready for you." "Yes." "I..." "I gotta go." "Do not hang up on me." "Richard, do not..." "So listen, we're pumped, guys." "We're thrilled to be getting into Pied Piper right at this inflection point." "It's very exciting." "We are pumped as well." "Aren't we, Richard?" "Richard." " Pumped." " Pumped!" " We are pumped up." " Pumped up." "So we'll just need your John Hancock right here." "Oh, sure, Richard." "You can use my Montblanc." "This is an actual term sheet." "And once I sign this..." "this, that's it, right?" "Yup." "No turning back." "You can have your lawyers vet the actual stock purchase agreement once we close here just to make sure no one is pulling any funny business." "No, no." "No, my lawyer is in jail, so." "So." "Oh, my God." "I..." "Wow, I can't believe I didn't think of this before... because, well, let me put it to you this way." "What would you say if I told you that the same compression that you know and love is being used in a world-beating, game-changing... wait for it... video conferencing application?" "Wouldn't that be interesting?" " What?" " You mean like Hooli-Chat?" "This will be far superior to Hooli-Chat." "You may want to fund that instead." "In fact, why don't I... why don't I just go home, I'll grab my laptop," "I'll come back here, I'll show it to you guys." "It's not that far." "I don't mind." " I'll tell you what, I'll grab an Uber." " Richard, what..." " No, no, no, no." " It's no problem." " Richard, what the fuck are you doing?" " There." "I've ordered it." "Neal is in a blue Kia Sportage and he's right around the corner." "All right, all right." "Look, look, look." "I don't know who else you're talking to about the platform, but I'm willing to go up to seven million on 70." "Okay?" "But that's it." "You sign this thing right here and right now." "Bravo, Richard." "Nice neg." "Now sign it." "Thank you." "Very generous of you." "I just..." "I just want to make sure that you're aware of all the feedback 'cause we had some focus groups and there were some issues." "Just so you're clear, people have been wondering, "Eh!" "Where are my files?" " "Zero K used?" "Where's the download button?" " Richard, Richard..." " The terminator... "" " All right, all right, you know what?" " 'Cause it..." " I'm gonna sign it." "Can I sign it?" "I'll sign it." "You can if you want, but we still need his signature." "Richard, sign it." "That's two years of runway." " Sign it now!" " I can't." "Why the fuck not?" "Because the numbers are fake." "What?" "What do you mean?" " What do you..." " We bought... fake users from a Bangladeshi click farm." "The uptick was fake." "But the... the vid chat... is real." "Erlich, the fake users were just meant to cheer the guys up." "I had no idea you were gonna take those numbers..." "And what, and go do my fucking job?" "!" "Pour everything I had into getting the best possible deal for Pied Piper because I believe in them?" "Well, that's all over now." "Richard, we are fucked!" "In the amount of time that it took for us to get from that office to right here, every VC in the Valley knows about this." "If I signed those term sheets, I would be committing fraud." "That's a fucking crime!" "You're saying you wanted me to..." "No, I wanted you to fucking think about that before you paraded me around the whole fucking valley to sell your lie!" "And then suddenly grew a thick, girthy conscience and fucked me with it." "Are you Richard?" " Did you order an Uber?" " No." "All you had to do was keep your fucking mouth shut and sign that piece of paper." "We would have fixed it afterwards." "But you didn't." "You caked your pants." "No, better yet, you caked my pants." "Fuck you, Richard Hendricks." "Fuck you." "Richard Hendricks, huh?" "Prick." " Hey." " Oh, hey, Monica." "Is Richard here?" "I heard what happened, but he's not answering any of my calls." "We just wanted you to know for the record that we had no idea any of that stuff was going on." "Still trying to wrap our heads around it." "Point is, don't beat yourself up about not seeing it." "I'm not beating myself up..." "I hope you don't think we're guilty by association, because then we would have to think you're guilty by association, which we don't." "Just want to let you know that we would definitely work with you again in the future." "It's good to know." "Guys, thanks." "Is he in his room?" "I mean, he said he was." "But..." "I'm gonna go to his room." "What's up, Gleb?" "I hear..." "Richard shit bed, huh?" "So, the platform is no goo..." "Fuck, now the vid chat's fucking up." "Odd, considering who wrote the code for it." "Not the code." "The server is overloaded." "How is that possible?" "We only gave it to like 12 people." "Well, there's a few more than that using it now." "Holy shit." "For what it's worth, Richard," "I think you did the right thing." "And I can see now why you didn't want to come to us for funding." "You were trying to protect us." "Yeah." "Well, I really appreciate it." "Laurie wants out." "Even a whiff of fraud is a mortal sin for VCs." "She needs to wash her hands of any Pied Piper business." "She's forcing a sale." "Fuck." "Yeah, frick." "Yeah." "But it is an open auction, and, you know, between the fraudulent numbers and the real numbers, you guys aren't exactly killing it out there." "So, there is a chance that no one will bid and you might be able to buy back your own company for next to nothing." "That will have to be for literally nothing because we're out of money." "Jesus!" "Are you okay?" "Yeah, we're fine." "All right, I spun together a few more servers." "That should handle the traffic." "Look at this." "There are 157 people using it near Gleb." "And 400 people using it near Tara in Boston." "Yeah, I told her to give it to her Satanist friends out there." "Looks like she did." "She knows 400 Satanists in Boston?" "The Catholic church really did a number on that town." "Hey, Erlich, remember when Gilfoyle said that my video chat app was a piece of shit and that nobody would ever use it?" "Well, he was wrong." "Over 4,000 times." "Wow, and you developed that with the Pied Piper IP, right?" "Well, then you can kiss that goodbye." "Oh, fuck." "Speaking of, I'm actually using the first dollars of my blog windfall on a trip to Kainchi Dham Ashram in Nainital, India, where Steve Jobs famously sought peace and came up with the idea for a little product called the Lisa." "Good luck." "Richard, I'll expect you off the premises by end of day." "Monica." " I'll see you later." " Okay." "You know, you can stay here for one year." "Free rent." "Jian-Yang!" "Laurie!" "Gavin." "You know Jack, of course." "That is correct." "Gavin, can we address the elephant in the room?" " Sorry?" " Pied Piper." "Right." "Yes, of course." "I am forcing a sale." "Your Maleant dealings demonstrate that you're still pursuing a middle-out." "Might you be interested in placing a bid?" "Why would he want to bail out Raviga?" "You said it yourself, our compression play is thriving." "Fair enough." "You know what?" "I'm a completionist." "Even if I buy it just to throw it in the garbage," "I'd like to be the one to drive the final nail in the Hendricks coffin." "I'll give you... $900 for it?" "I believe that is a joke." "You know what?" "I like nice, round numbers." "Make it... a million?" "A million dollars?" "Gavin Belson gets to buy Pied Piper for $1 million and Raviga gets all of it because of their liquidation preference and I get jack shit?" "Is that what you're telling me?" "Goddamn it." "I know this is the last way that you wanted it to end." "I'm really sorry." "Yeah, well, I..." "I'll see you at the meeting." "Is that Hooli-Chat?" "They fix it or something?" "That didn't look shitty at all." "Actually, it's... it's ours." "The guys hacked it together." "I can send you an invite if you want." "Yeah." "Cool." "Thanks." "We got up to 4K users totally organically." "Oh, shit!" "7K now." "Wow, we should have been focusing on this instead." "Not that it matters." "I mean, it's all gonna be property of Gavin Belson in an hour, so." "That's ironic, huh?" "N... no, for real, I'm asking." "Is it?" "I don't know." "I was just smiling." "Feels ironic." "Hey... so thank you for... letting me stay here." "No worries." "Steve says you're welcome to take my spot on the couch until you can find a job and get your own place." "Thanks." "So... when's your dad coming to pick you up?" "A couple of hours I guess." "Then we're turning right around and going back to Phoenix." "You know, he said he wants to be able to keep an eye on me and my money and that I need to get a real job to learn the value of a..." "of a hard day's night or something like that." "Well..." "I should probably get going to this board meeting." "And you're probably gonna be gone when I'm back, so..." " guess this is it." " Yeah, I guess so." "See ya." " Okay." " Okay." " All right." "Cool, man." " There we go." "Richard, e... even though it's the last board meeting and... and essentially meaningless, thank you for letting me be a part of it." "It's an honor." "Okay, you don't have to keep saying that." "Good day, all." "This should be brief." "The only item on the agenda is, of course, the authorization of the sale of Pied Piper to the current high bidder." "Three "yes" votes will approve the sale." "And as Raviga controls three of the board seats," " it seems..." " I'm sorry." "I..." "I'm not doing it." "Oh, Monica, not again." "I'm sorry, but look, Richard has worked too hard and I know that I can't stop it, but I'm not gonna vote to let Pied Piper become the property of that asshole." "Monica, I also happen to find him contemptible." "But Pied Piper will be sold to the high bidder, period." "You know what?" "I don't care." "You want to fire me, fire me." "If we're not gonna adhere to the values that" "Peter Gregory instilled, then I don't think I belong here." "Monica, you don't have to do this." " I'm not voting yes." " Very well." "You're off the board." "Excuse me!" "Man!" "Do you work here?" "Well, it was my first day actually." " Everybody's been super ni..." " Sit." "You are now officially on the board of directors of Pied Piper." "Oh, okay." "That's fine I guess." "When I point to you, you will vote yes." "Now, I move to vote on the sale of Pied Piper." "I vote yes." "I vote yes." "And Evan." "Evan?" "I can't do it." "What?" "Why?" "Because..." "Monica?" "I love you." "There." "I said it." " And I could never do anything to make you sad." " Oh, for fuck's sake!" "Do I have to pull the receptionist in here?" "How does this compare with a typical board meeting?" "All right, stop." "Everybody, just stop." "We all know how this is gonna go, so let's just get it over with." "All right?" "I vote yes." "There." "Okay?" "I approve the sale." "Three "yes" votes." "Can this please just be done?" "Very well." "I vote yes also." "Irrelevant." "But thank you." "The sale is approved." "Pied Piper, its IP, and all of its assets are now officially the property of Bachmanity, LLC." "Wait, sorry, did... did you just say "Bachmanity"?" "As in Erlich Bachman and Nelson Bighetti?" "Yes, you know them." "They... wait, they... they had the highest bid?" "I received a telephone call approximately 30 minutes ago entering a bid of one million and one dollars with a firm no-shop clause." "So when you were referring to the person who bought Pied Piper as a contemptible asshole, you were talking about Erlich?" "To which contemptible asshole did you think I was referring?" "Gavin Belson." "I see." "No." "This meeting is adjourned." "I thank you all for your time." "So..." "Bachmanity it is." "That's good." "So... should we give this thing a shot?" "You and Big Head, huh?" "Sorry you had to cancel your trip." "And look, I..." "I really appreciate all this." "I really think this video chat thing is gonna be something, you know?" " I don't know if you've seen the numbers." " You want a number?" "The percentage I give a fuck about you, zero." "It's trending steady." "And of course I've seen the numbers." "This is a business opportunity." "Nothing more." "Big Head was your friend." "He was the one that... talked me into it." "I don't trust you, Richard Hendricks." "And it's gonna take a long, long, long time to regain my trust." "Are we clear?" "Are we absolutely clear?" "Always blue!" "Always blue!" "You suck." "Oh, fuck, it's my dad again." "He's gotta be so pissed." "I can't believe this is happening, you guys." "I mean, I guess now we're a video chat company, but the best part of it is it's us, you know?" "Just us controlling our own destiny." "No, the best part of it is I own 50%." "Well, yes, you and Big Head do own the entire company, but I am the founder, it's my algorithm, so I'm assuming I'm getting my original shares back, right?" "Why would you assume that?" "Well, when a tech company reboots, it's normal to have a... a conversation about restructuring the cap table." "Good, 'cause I'm the guy that hacked together the video chat app to see if that woman was hot, so..." "Yeah, but it's not gonna scale until I get in there and scrape all the Dinesh off." "Well, Laurie still hasn't called me back, so I may need a new job." "And I'm assuming Pied Piper can't afford my salary, so I'll need stock." "Do we really want it to be called Pied Piper anymore?" "No, yes." "Of cour... of..." "of course we want..." "Why do we want to change the name?" "It's great." "Yeah, and we do already have the jackets." "Big." "Head." "Big Head." "Go for Erlich." "Erlich Bachman, this is you as an old man." "I'm ugly and I'm dead." "Alone." "I'm gonna let him have this one." "All right... well, I'm sorry to hear that, Future Me." "What a terrible thing." "I'll talk to you in several years." "You're up." "Always blue!" "Always blue!"