No, I know someone who also experienced this with Stripe a few months ago.

Rescinding intern offers is also bad, but it's not nearly the same in impact as rescinding a full-time offer for a lot of reasons.

I haven't seen this from Google or Facebook, but we should call them out if it happens!

I'd say rescinding intern offers is just as bad. To the company maybe it's not a big deal. They're an intern, afterall. Companies like to treat them poorly.

For interns--it's a huge deal. They probably stopped interviewing at other places, and it's not necessarily so easy as just restarting the process. Batches might be full. Your schedule might only allow for internships in at one time of the year (summer), and the available positions for interns are often fixed-windows, especially at larger companies.

At a school like waterloo, it could mean derailing an entire semester of school. These early jobs are also potentially big breaks. Getting to pick from any company in the bay is a luxury--one that interns don't have.

Yes, but I'm talking about to the individual, not the company.

Someone with a full-time job often has not just stopped interviewing elsewhere but resigned from their current job, and began planning a move for their family, and now will struggle to put food on the table.

Possibly derailing an entire semester of school is just a bit different.

I'd say it's even worse than just derailing an entire semester of school.

If you can get a job full-time at AirBnB you can probably get a good full-time job just about anywhere. So while it may be really bad (I doubt you'll be struggling to put food on the table unless you mismanage your expenses) you can probably land something somewhere else and you usually don't resign until after you've at least signed the paperwork for the offer - at least I wouldn't.

If you get rescinded from AirBnB as an intern that might change your entire life trajectory and that's still true even if you find another internship. You might go from high-growth career opportunities to bottom of the barrel very quickly. Then when you apply for your next internship or job? Guess what now you're competing with all of those who didn't get rescinded offers. It has compounding effects.

So I think we shouldn't really dismiss either. I'd say both are just about as bad as the other in their own ways.

My point is that the person who is already gainfully employed can probably get a job basically anywhere else in silicon valley.

Getting your first break is much harder. the fact we have the "first big break" metaphor at all in our language is illuminating of that fact.