Ethereum Foundation Lawsuit Alleges Suicide Pledge in Internal Mandate

A Boulder woman has sued The Ethereum Foundation in federal court, alleging she was fired after leading employee resistance to a suicide pledge included in a 38-page internal mandate. The lawsuit says the nonprofit, which supports the Ethereum cryptocurrency network valued at about $300 billion, gave employees days to commit to the mandate or leave.

Suicide pledge in mandate

According to the lawsuit, employees received "The Ethereum Foundation Mandate" on a Friday in March. The 38-page document outlined leadership's vision for the next 1,000 years and included illustrations with anime-style characters, glowing lights, cartoon flowers, rainbows and diamonds. On page 11 was a "Source Seppuku License" pledge stating that authors, maintainers, editors and distributors of "this software" would ensure it remained free and publicly accessible and would "take his or her own life with a sword upon failure to uphold any of the pledges in this license." Employees were told to commit by Monday or quit. They had to choose between committing to the mandate's direction or saying they could not commit and requesting extra months of compensation before leaving. A foundation leader at the time said the pledge was not meant to be taken literally, and managers later updated the form to say it had "nothing to do with literal seppuku," according to the lawsuit.

Employee resistance and firings

Resistance began when a draft went to staff in late February, the lawsuit says. Employees questioned whether they were pledging to die by suicide and whether the pledge tested loyalty. One employee referenced a colleague's recent death by suicide, and another wrote that a new hire's first impression would be a motion requiring "the ultimate sacrifice by falling on a sword," according to the complaint. Nearly 80 of about 250 employees voted to remove the pledge, but leadership included it word-for-word in the final version, presenting it in an illustration rather than the main body. The visual style reflected imagery from a controversial online figure known to promote white nationalist ideology and disturbing pro-anorexia content, the lawsuit says. When a board member objected, Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin said the controversialness of those aesthetics was part of the point. Bastian Aue, then co-executive director, defended the pledge as "part of the artwork of the mandate" and a cultural reference not meant literally. Kayleen Fulton and a colleague organized a letter signed by 53 employees who endorsed the mandate's general direction but declined to return the commitment form and did not resign. Aue allowed signers to keep their jobs but fired Fulton and her colleague. Buterin later told Fulton, who had just been diagnosed with cancer, that the firing concerned company dynamics, saying that rewarding "making a stink" would show others how to cause outcomes inside the foundation, according to the complaint.

Lawsuit and fallout

The lawsuit says the mandate started an exodus. The board member who objected began a sabbatical the day Fulton was fired and resigned in June. By September, eight senior employees had left, and most of the 53 signers had resigned or been terminated. Fulton, who earned $195,000, sued for disability discrimination, retaliation, interference with her rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act, unfair employment practices and related claims. The foundation does not hire or pay its United States staff in its own name and instead uses employer-of-record service companies, according to the lawsuit. An email seeking comment was not immediately returned Thursday, and one of Fulton's attorneys declined to comment, saying the lawsuit spoke for itself.

Sources: denverpost.com