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Ex-Digg CEO Jay Adelson is Starting an Incubator

27 points by rsingel 16y ago

jasonjei 16y ago
This is fantastic news. More opportunities for startups to find support and funding. Startups can probably learn a lot from Digg and Jay's experience.
citizenkeys 16y ago
YCombinator is mentioned by name in the article, describing it as an incubator. "YCombinator is the most successful of the new breed. Twice a year, Paul Graham along with co-founder and now-wife Jessica Livingston choose 30 or so companies from thousands of applicants, invest about $25,000 in exchange for about 6 percent of a company. They then mentor the groups for a few months, urging them to build and launch quickly..."
ojbyrne 16y ago
So, here's how I see what Jay brought to the table at Digg: - Lots of contacts to close the series A (a plus). - Did not move to SF when the company's office was established there (a minus). - Brought in a large group of people he worked with before at high salaries to be the "management" group (a minus). - Used Digg to subsidize the establishment of Revision3, a company that he had a much larger ownership share in (including having full-time employees working for Revision 3, but paid by Digg, as well as Revision3 using Digg facilities and intellectual property). (A huge minus). - Failed in the one thing that a parachuted-in CEO is supposed to do, secure an exit (another huge minus). So you're going to let him incubate your company? You're a fool.
- noneedtosay 16y ago
  I think that, if you're going to post such a terribly immature and defamatory comment, and presumably do so from some perspective of "I was involved with Digg, I'm an insider," you have to provide some personal basis for it. I think Jay's a good guy. It isn't his fault that Eric Schmidt walked away from the acquisition. And it isn't his fault that Kevin Rose would use his power as "founder of Digg" to arbitrarily dictate strategy -- only to return to doing "cool" things worth tweeting about once he had turned everything upside down. You don't have to take my word for it -- Kevin's illustrious Twitter feed speaks for itself. You really need to get over yourself. You were a contract programmer who happened to work on the right project. Comments such as these give others pause to ever want to work with you. Jay, on the other hand... He never talks about what it's like to work alongside a complete nightmare like Kevin Rose. Never says a bad thing about him, or about the executives who would choose Kevin's stupid ideas over Jay's wisdom. Jay never said anything bad about Google or Eric Schmidt, who clearly lead him down a blind alley before running away. And no, I'm not a friend of Jay's, or a friend of Kevin's, or an employee of Digg. Guess that's true for you as well, huh?
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - ojbyrne 16y ago
    I appreciate your criticism, and take it to heart, except for that one big word "defamatory." Everything I've mentioned above is documented in one place or another and not just "insiderish."

27 points by rsingel 16y ago

This is fantastic news. More opportunities for startups to find support and funding. Startups can probably learn a lot from Digg and Jay's experience.

citizenkeys 16y ago

YCombinator is mentioned by name in the article, describing it as an incubator. "YCombinator is the most successful of the new breed. Twice a year, Paul Graham along with co-founder and now-wife Jessica Livingston choose 30 or so companies from thousands of applicants, invest about $25,000 in exchange for about 6 percent of a company. They then mentor the groups for a few months, urging them to build and launch quickly..."

ojbyrne 16y ago

So, here's how I see what Jay brought to the table at Digg: - Lots of contacts to close the series A (a plus). - Did not move to SF when the company's office was established there (a minus). - Brought in a large group of people he worked with before at high salaries to be the "management" group (a minus). - Used Digg to subsidize the establishment of Revision3, a company that he had a much larger ownership share in (including having full-time employees working for Revision 3, but paid by Digg, as well as Revision3 using Digg facilities and intellectual property). (A huge minus). - Failed in the one thing that a parachuted-in CEO is supposed to do, secure an exit (another huge minus). So you're going to let him incubate your company? You're a fool.

noneedtosay 16y ago
I think that, if you're going to post such a terribly immature and defamatory comment, and presumably do so from some perspective of "I was involved with Digg, I'm an insider," you have to provide some personal basis for it. I think Jay's a good guy. It isn't his fault that Eric Schmidt walked away from the acquisition. And it isn't his fault that Kevin Rose would use his power as "founder of Digg" to arbitrarily dictate strategy -- only to return to doing "cool" things worth tweeting about once he had turned everything upside down. You don't have to take my word for it -- Kevin's illustrious Twitter feed speaks for itself. You really need to get over yourself. You were a contract programmer who happened to work on the right project. Comments such as these give others pause to ever want to work with you. Jay, on the other hand... He never talks about what it's like to work alongside a complete nightmare like Kevin Rose. Never says a bad thing about him, or about the executives who would choose Kevin's stupid ideas over Jay's wisdom. Jay never said anything bad about Google or Eric Schmidt, who clearly lead him down a blind alley before running away. And no, I'm not a friend of Jay's, or a friend of Kevin's, or an employee of Digg. Guess that's true for you as well, huh?
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- ojbyrne 16y ago
  I appreciate your criticism, and take it to heart, except for that one big word "defamatory." Everything I've mentioned above is documented in one place or another and not just "insiderish."