To be completely honest, after seeing everything that has transpired, I would be worried that the offer is just a lie, a way to out the detractors. I’m wondering if that’s the reason less than 10% accepted the first offer.
However, I do think a fair amount of automattic employees do not want to leave since their benefits seem actually really nice. Not many companies provide constant pay regardless of your cost of living, so I commend them for that. It could be impossible to find an equivalent job for non US employees, so 6 months pay for leaving in this market is hardly worth it, unless like you said you had plans to do it anyway.
I expect that even Matt is aware that that is not an unreasonable assumption. Purportedly, via Bullenweg, an email went out yesterday re another offer, and it included this, from Matt:
> You have my word this deal will be honored. We will try to keep this quiet, so it won’t be used against us, but I still wanted to give Automatticians another window.
I mean that would have to be a first. "We're offering voluntary resignations with these benefits" followed by "and I promise we'll actually offer those benefits" - shows you how low trust seems to be at Automattic.