After strenuously opposing it for three years, in which Baker alone made something like $5-6m, and only because it had become a talking point in media. They still make a cool half million on average - I understand that's small potatoes in SV, but in the great scheme of things it's still a lot.

Beard stepped down roughly a year before the "Exec salaries ballooned while user rate dropped" Cal Peterson post became a talking point. And in the grand scheme of things, executive salary was never more than a few percent of annual spending.