Tech Startup Stripe Accidentally Put a Cartoon Duck in Their Lay Off Email

Getting laid off is a tough pill to swallow for anyone, but at least Stripe employees got a consolation prize with the crushing email: a picture of a cartoon duck.

During the height of the pandemic lockdowns, tech companies went on a hiring frenzy, loading up with way more employees than they needed long term. C-suite tech execs, from app developers to video game studios, with terrible foresight and questionable business skills have slowly accepted they have more employees than they should.

As a result, they are seemingly taking turns conducting one mass layoff after another. Stripe, a financial services company and the second-largest tech startup in the Bay Area, is following suit but laid off their 300 employees in a bizarre and embarrassing way.

According to a report from Business Insider, Stripe accidentally emailed a picture of a cute cartoon duck with the words “US-Non-California Duck” above it to some of the employees they were firing. And they sent it as a PDF attachment, no less.

The email also included an incorrect termination date. Wonderful attention to detail from a financial services company.

There is something a little, I don’t know, reassuring (?) about this story. The modern tech industry has a cold, calculating vibe to it. There’s no warmth and humanity to any of it. So, of course, they would fire you in the coldest, most cowardly, inept way possible. It so perfectly aligns with my mental image of the tech industry.

I’ve been laid off via email before, and I thought that was a pretty cowardly thing to do. But now I can say at least I wasn’t fired via email with a PDF of a cartoon duck attached to it.

Although, honestly, it doesn’t make me feel that much better, because apparently there is no bottom and everything just gets worse, because we just keep handing more and more responsibility to the stupidest, laziest, most unimaginative, and least talented people on Earth.