Tuesday, April 02, 2002


My friend Glenn, who also did his time at Amazon.com (though earlier than I did) wrote me today to call me out on the carpet:

Your ad in the NY Times (quite nice!) states, "His non-disclosure agreement has expired!" I'm going to sue you for false advertising. You know perfectly well, as I have beaten you over the head about it for months and months, that your NDA *did not expire*. Your NON-COMPETE expired. Your NDA is in effect forever. Read it. It never expires. Never never never. Never.

You're not doing a show about the business details and relationships underlying Amazon.com, but about the culture. You were never prohibited from talking about that even while you worked there (although the company could have fired you, but they couldn't have sued you).

Stop the lies!

And break a leg.


Glenn is absolutely, unequivocably correct. It is, in fact, more creepy to know that the NDA never expires, ever, even after my own death...it was indeed only my non-compete portion which expired, and since mikedaisey.com does not use any proprietary trade secrets stolen from Amazon in its operating, I would seem to be safe.

Glenn's evocative alternative is that we say, "His non-disclosure is in full effect, and he still tells all!" I have to admit, that's pretty catchy as well--if only we could have afforded to bring him onboard for online sales and viral marketing in this campaign. That would have rocked.


5:03 PM