Companies He's Damaged
Adam Seligman has left a trail of destruction at every major tech company he's worked for. From the infamous Salesforce Hackathon scandal to failed products at AWS, his career is marked by controversy, mismanagement, and broken promises.
As VP of Developer Marketing, Seligman oversaw the infamous $1M hackathon that turned into a PR disaster when it was revealed the winning team had insider advantages.
"The Dirty Secret Behind the Salesforce $1M Hackathon... just another marketing gimmick"
- Alicia Liu, Medium
As VP of Developer Relations, Seligman's tenure coincided with growing discontent in Google's developer community and internal challenges in the DevRel team.
As COO, Seligman was part of the leadership team that laid off 25% of Mozilla's workforce (250+ employees) just months after joining, despite hiring new executives.
"Mozilla is laying off 250 people and planning a 'new focus' on making money"
- The Verge
As head of Amazon Honeycode, Seligman presided over a product that was quietly phased out due to lackluster adoption and development stagnation.
"Amazon's Honeycode Cloud Service May Be on Its Way Out... providing bare minimum support"
- Business Insider
Seligman's Salesforce hackathon became infamous when developers discovered the winning team had unfair advantages, including being former Salesforce employees who had worked on the solution before the competition.
The Fallout:
Seligman had to issue a public apology admitting "We didn't get this right," but the damage was done. The event was widely covered as a "hackathon scandal" in tech media.
Just months after joining Mozilla as COO, Seligman was part of the leadership team that executed massive layoffs of 250 employees (25% of workforce), despite having recently hired new executives.
The Fallout:
The layoffs were widely covered as Mozilla shifting focus to revenue over mission, with many long-time employees publicly expressing disappointment.
Under Seligman's leadership, Amazon Honeycode - a no-code app builder - failed to gain traction and was quietly phased out with "bare minimum support" according to insiders.
The Fallout:
Business Insider reported Honeycode was "on its way out," with one outlet stating its future "is not looking so sweet."
Beyond formal scandals, Seligman has attracted criticism in developer communities and anonymous employee forums throughout his career.
The Fallout:
While some criticism is anecdotal, the pattern suggests consistent dissatisfaction among those affected by Seligman's decisions.
Hackathon Participant
"The Dirty Secret Behind the Salesforce $1M Hackathon... just another marketing gimmick to make developers work for free."
Anonymous
"The layoffs were devastating. We lost so much institutional knowledge while leadership kept their jobs after just months at the company."
Hacker News Comment
"I was wondering why AWS employees were pushing Firefox so much... It's Adam Seligman."
Tech Reporter
"Amazon is now providing bare minimum support for Honeycode... employees say the service is being phased out."
His track record shows a pattern of failed leadership, damaged developer relations, and broken trust.