4 ms·

It's not the first time Dan Wagner has done this - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Wagner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Wagner

pjc50 11y ago
"He is best known for his leadership of Dialog and its subsequent 95% share price drop in 2000" - well that's kind of a brutal biography there. Powa does seem to me to have all the hallmarks of a full-vaporware company intended to scam as much funding as possible before the bubble bursts.
- pauljohncleary 11y ago
  That's probably not that fair to lead the page with - if you read the rest of the wikipedia article you'll see that he founded Dialog in 1984 when he was 21 and it went public 10 years later. It looks like he made some major mistakes later on and during the dot-com crash, but building and running a multi-billion dollar company for 16 years is better than 99.9% of HN users achievements. I wouldn't chalk off Powa's failure to one person.
- notahacker 11y ago
  "Wagner became known for becoming a CEO of a public company in his 20s which is even more impressive given at the time he was 31" Someone's had fun writing that biography
madaxe_again 11y ago
Indeed. I'm close to the ecommerce industry, and can say without hesitation that powa was an utter shower. Their tech wasn't innovative. It barely worked. It required users to install qr code scanning apps - their entire product is a simple, pre-existing and minor feature in our platform and others. Not much demand for qr bullshittery. They were painfully expensive to merchants, hostile to platforms and agencies, and often lied in pitches, telling clients we had partnered when the truth was we'd told them where to go hang. I don't think it was ever intended to work - it was just a mechanism to part vcs with their ill gotten cash. At least it's crooks robbing crooks. He'll be prime minister one day.
Doctor_Fegg 11y ago
Some amusing edits by this Wikipedia account suspected to be linked with Powa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Techtrek https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Techtrek The second diff changed "Known for: serial bankruptcy" to "Known for: Consistently anticipating technology trends"...

pjc50 11y ago

"He is best known for his leadership of Dialog and its subsequent 95% share price drop in 2000" - well that's kind of a brutal biography there. Powa does seem to me to have all the hallmarks of a full-vaporware company intended to scam as much funding as possible before the bubble bursts.

pauljohncleary 11y ago
That's probably not that fair to lead the page with - if you read the rest of the wikipedia article you'll see that he founded Dialog in 1984 when he was 21 and it went public 10 years later. It looks like he made some major mistakes later on and during the dot-com crash, but building and running a multi-billion dollar company for 16 years is better than 99.9% of HN users achievements. I wouldn't chalk off Powa's failure to one person.
notahacker 11y ago
"Wagner became known for becoming a CEO of a public company in his 20s which is even more impressive given at the time he was 31" Someone's had fun writing that biography

madaxe_again 11y ago

Indeed. I'm close to the ecommerce industry, and can say without hesitation that powa was an utter shower. Their tech wasn't innovative. It barely worked. It required users to install qr code scanning apps - their entire product is a simple, pre-existing and minor feature in our platform and others. Not much demand for qr bullshittery. They were painfully expensive to merchants, hostile to platforms and agencies, and often lied in pitches, telling clients we had partnered when the truth was we'd told them where to go hang. I don't think it was ever intended to work - it was just a mechanism to part vcs with their ill gotten cash. At least it's crooks robbing crooks. He'll be prime minister one day.

Doctor_Fegg 11y ago

Some amusing edits by this Wikipedia account suspected to be linked with Powa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Techtrek https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Techtrek The second diff changed "Known for: serial bankruptcy" to "Known for: Consistently anticipating technology trends"...