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Kevin Rose Will Join Google
- joelmaat 15y agoIs this a joke?
- smackfu 15y agoHa, that's one way to "pivot".
- untog 15y agoHuh. It was just yesterday that they shut down Oink to "work on other ideas"- so that was a total lie? Heaven forbid they should just be straightforward about what's going on. As someone who'd love some VC money, it's a little disheartening to see $1.7 million of it thrown around and wasted based on one person's name.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- samstave 15y agoNo, you don't understand. He is going to "work on others' ideas" -- i.e. Ideas that are not his own. --- What will be really commical, is if he is going to join google with the intent to work on Google+ -- as if he were some success in the "social" play. Remember, digg failed because it alienated the users, attempted to wrap too much UI around the content; limiting the consumption rate, and pandering to media channels. Unless KRose can pull a magical pivot on his own visioning abilities - this would be bad. However, I will send good thoughts his way. Let's hope we see him do something truly revolutionary to + (if that is what he is going there for) and lets hope he follows the mantra of the new Reddit CEO: "Don't Fuck It Up'
- untog 15y agoRemember, digg failed because it alienated the users, attempted to wrap too much UI around the content; limiting the consumption rate, and pandering to media channels. To be fair, I think that was after Kevin left his role as CEO.
- reidmain 15y agoHe was the CEO when Digg v4 was released and was one of the driving forces behind it. Digg v4 was the dagger that killed Digg.
- cryptoz 15y agoBanning anyone who mentioned a certain number didn't help much either. Digg's policies were terrible long before v4 came out. Edit: 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
- moreorless 15y agoFYI - the ban was not his idea. He was very much against the idea. There was quite an internal struggle during the course of that day.
- cookiecaper 15y agoiirc that policy was reversed within a day or two and there was no major exodus from digg as a result of the event
- yalespector 15y agoAh, what a day that was.
- donnfelker 15y agoWelcome to the valley, the line forms to the left. :\
- jbigelow76 15y agoDon't expect the trend to stop, just the other day were several HN threads regarding Y Combinator accepting people without ideas. You don't even need a track record anymore, if you can create a viral video on techcrunch to show what a hustler you are somebody will probably throw some money at you. It's like VCs watched the movie Moneyball (or read the book) and are applying what they saw to the VC world... but in reverse.
- AznHisoka 15y ago"Rose has also had an impressive run as an angel investor, putting money into companies like Fab, Zynga, ngmoco, Foursquare and Twitter." Does anyone know if Rose was one of the first few to actually invest in these companies, or did he just have the connections and put his money in while they were already "hot" companies? If the latter, I wouldn't consider it that impressive...
- jgrahamc 15y agoDetails in CrunchBase: http://www.crunchbase.com/person/kevin-rose http://www.crunchbase.com/person/kevin-rose Fab (Series A), Zynga (Series B), Twitter (Series B), Foursquare (Angel). Only Foursquare looks like an Angel, the rest look more like he knows the right people and/or has the right name.
- drewblaisdell 15y agoYou do realize that all of those companies grew immensely after their Series A/B rounds of funding, right? Regardless of what I think of the guy, there is a lot of hate on here, and it's easy to look back and say "well of course Twitter did well, he's so lucky he got to invest in it in '08" as if it was common knowledge that it would be this big.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- kmfrk 15y agoNot to mention that people on HN still aren't sure whether said companies will be profitable.
- jgrahamc 15y agoFeels like a Google-jumped-the-shark moment.
- ot 15y agoCan you elaborate?
- harold 15y agoApparently Google thinks Kevin Rose is "The Fonz" and intends to have him jump a tank with a shark in it. At the last minute, Rose decides to found a new company called "Soda" instead. Leaves Google scratching head and previous investors still wondering where their money went. Crowd unhappy because they wanted to see their hero/villain successful/eaten.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- jgrahamc 15y agoSure. My view is that Rose has done a very good job of making a name for himself and translating that into personal wealth. It is not clear that that adds anything to Google and if Google thinks it does then my view of Google is diminished.
- ot 15y agoI see what you mean. I guess it will all depend on what kind of role he will have at Google. If he's going to be appointed "VP of Next Cool Ideas", I think you are absolutely right.
- herval 15y agoI'm sorry if the question is naive, but if he made such a great amount of personal wealth, why would he still want/need to "get a job" (regardless of company)?
- hinathan 15y agoDid not see that coming. This seems like an odd route for to Google add depth to Plus.
- samstave 15y agoWhat is this term you are using, Depth?
- debacle 15y agoIf you're not being facetious, depth in this context refers to the overall quality of your staff. A good example of a lack of depth would be the Indianapolis Colts, who with the loss of Peyton Manning had a dismal, almost winless season. A good example of a team with a lot of depth would be Ask Ketchum's pokemon. He's got a Charizard, a Butterfree, a Wortortle, a Pidgiotto, and Pikachu. If one of his pokemon gets injured, he has a handful of equally good pokemon suited to other tasks that can fill in.
- natesm 15y agoDidn't he let the Butterfree go fairly early?
- _sentient 15y agoAs his last couple startups (Digg + Milk) have seen fairly bumpy roads of late, I can't blame him for wanting to leave the startup scene in favor of a little stability, courtesy of Google. It will be interesting to see what role he ends up playing at Google. He's not much of a developer, so I suspect his role will largely be a promotional one. Either way, I wish him luck with this latest endeavor. Having seen the Digg implosion, followed by the failure of Oink, I hope this third venture proves to be the charm.
- kenrikm 15y agoStability? with his investments I doubt that he needs the cash so there must be more to it. Possibly a case of "The grass is greener" Either way I don't see this lasting very long.
- kenrikm 15y agoWow, if Google did not acquire Milk outright I wonder what type of deal was worked out with the investors? There would have to be some type of upside for them otherwise KR's reputation would be seriously tarnished. "Sorry guys, remember that money you gave me to start a company?. Well no more company and I'm off to bigger and better things, K tnx Bye"
- k-mcgrady 15y agoI would guess that they just paid off the investors. It was only $1.7m and Google Ventures was one of the investors anyway.
- kenrikm 15y agoWell they would still need to have seen the returns they expected (or were happy with) since the money did not come out of the funds just to get "Put back" without any upside. Speculation: 3-4 million payoff Google "we don't need the company just shut it down and come to work"
- k-mcgrady 15y agoTechCrunch is reporting that Google paid $15-30m for it.
- speg 15y agoTechCrunch says $15-$30 million.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- AznHisoka 15y agowell, there's a lot of big names already working in Google who once owned companies. They probably have more leverage/freedom than the average google employee
- Drbble 15y agoAverage google employees have a lot of freedom too. It is a blessing and also a curse that leads to DOA product launches.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- xpose2000 15y agoSorry if this sounds harsh, and I know he has a lot of fans out there. But this guy struck gold 5 years ago with Digg. Sure, he deserves props for this. However, he's not a developer. He's an "ideas guy" as far as I can tell. As a developer, I hate these kinds of people because more often than not their ideas suck. In any case, what I am saying is that it seems like people in the industry get by based on one previous successful project. It doesn't matter if it happened yesterday or 10 years ago. It doesn't matter whether they had a little to do with it or a lot. It doesn't matter if they understand how to code or not. Once they have that reputation as being awesome it will stick around no matter how badly they perform after their initial success. What could he possibly be bringing to the table with Google? Just my two cents. I'm probably alone with this opinion, but it's extremely frustrating to see this stuff happen over and over again. /end rant
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- mmahemoff 15y agoFWIW Diggnation could be considered a second, successful, project. I consider it fairly independent of Digg, as either of them could really have operated independently.
- Timothee 15y agoI would extend that to Revision3. I'm not sure how successful they are financially but just based on the fact that they're still around with many many shows going, I'd guess they're doing just fine.
- untog 15y agoI don't want to be some sort of Kevin Rose defender in this thread, but I don't think it's fair to say that he just "had an idea". He had an idea and spent years working on it, iterating and improving until Digg finally hit the big time. I think he deserves credit for that. As a developer, I agree that some "ideas guys" suck. But some of them are fantastic, and have a huge talent in taking a core concept and fleshing out requirements, objectives and so on. Often we developers are actually really bad at that, and we end up getting distracted by endless refactoring, or bringing down response times, etc. etc. There is nothing wrong with a mix of the two.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- nkassis 15y agoCould you elaborate on what you mean, are you talking about Kevin Rose specifically? What makes you think he's after fame for fame sake?
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- paparoger 15y agoI think Kevin is a smart guy but for some reason he just seems to lack some focus on products and I wonder if going to Google will maybe somehow wack him into place a little? Hmmm
- sks 15y agoWell I guess one way to promote google+ is to hire every celebrity in the world and force them to abandon twitter and facebook.
- moondowner 15y agoI wasn't surprised when I red these news. He was constantly favouring or indirectly promoting Google's products/services/news via posts on Google+.
- LVB 15y agoMilk is going to have fun filling that Senior Engineer position.
- gavanwoolery 15y agoAnybody remember when google tried to acq-hire Path for 100 million? Hopefully this offer was not as ridiculous.
- vijayanands 15y agoI wonder if they are bringing him in, to setup an internal incubator of sorts, now that labs is shut down, perhaps they think its time to do it in some structured form. I know that there was talk of it, sometime back inside the company.
- pfisters 15y agoMy one hope here is that he uses his 20% time to bring back The Broken."
- moreorless 15y agoSorry to say, but The Broken is not coming back.
- patrickod 15y agoThis feels like a stunt on the part of Google. They have the money to throw around at ideas at the moment; KR seems to be a beneficiary of this. They get to hire a trendy name and hope that they can turn around G+ and other services.
- marcamillion 15y agoThis is interesting news...I wonder if he will explain it. In other news, does Kevin really own a piece of the Packers? http://twitter.com/#!/kevinrose/status/173532999881732096 http://twitter.com/#!/kevinrose/status/173532999881732096 Was that a joke or is that legit? Never knew his angel/digg/rev3 money was that large. What did I miss?
- Umalu 15y agoThe Packers recently sold new shares for $250 each, so by buying one share you could claim to be a co-owner. See: http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/7633420/green-bay-packers-sell-268000-plus-shares-raise-67m http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/7633420/green-bay-packers-...
- theorique 15y agoThe Green Bay Packers are community-owned. Anyone can buy a piece of the Packers - you don't have to be a {m,b}illionaire. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Bay_Packers#Public_company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Bay_Packers#Public_compa...
- marcamillion 15y agoAhh...ok...interesting. Thanks.
- kacy 15y agoIt makes sense the more that I think about it. Rose has said on his podcast and in other interviews that he regrets that Digg raised so much money. They had to focus on revenue instead of building the product. I'm sure he's a little disappointed at Milk's success thus far too. I guess he's possibly thinking that this will give him the opportunity build a huge product that he's always wanted without having to focus on the business side. If google is funding it, he doesn't have to work on raising money or increasing revenue. He'll also have hundreds of employees that can be thrown at his project. I'll be interested to see what he's up to.
- nikcub 15y agoTumblr and Twitter have both raised a lot of money and haven't had to focus on revenue. It is more about who your investors are rather than how much you raise. The 'focus on revenue' part of later Digg is what killed it.
- javery 15y agoGoogle doesn't have a good success based on this model though - look at Google Wave which was built under a similar premise.
- flannell 15y agoI do miss TechTV, had some classic moments with Kevin, Alex and the team http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4GYg-5AdRw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4GYg-5AdRw
- revorad 15y agoHardly anyone knows the details, but the amount of jealousy and hatred that comes out on HN on these stories is shocking.
- wavephorm 15y agoIf it's jealousy and hatred, then it's not because of being jealous of success. A lot of developers work really, really hard on their startups for years bootstrapping, just scraping by, and being ignored by investors because they're not famous. And Kevin Rose comes along with a half-baked idea of posting pictures of the food you're eating to the Internet, and his "startup" that he's "really dedicated to" get's almost a couple million just dropped in his lap for no reason and year later just whimsically quits and gets a job at Google with no real engineering skills or anything tangible to bring to the company other than stories of what actual developers produced at Digg.
- revorad 15y agoThat half-baked idea got hundreds of thousands of users in 3 months. That is success. Just because your definition of skills is limited to writing code does not mean having connections, being good at marketing, PR or selling has no value. It's exactly the same mentality we developers hate when idea-men want to hire us as code-monkeys to implement their perfect vision. Reading stories on tech blogs does not mean you know how much hard work someone put into their whimsical-seeming startup. Being a celebrity certainly does not automatically imply you don't have to work hard. And just working really really hard also does not entitle you to success. Life is unfair. Get used to it.
- bentlegen 15y agoI thought success was measured in dollars, not a shuttered web service.
- wavephorm 15y agoThat's exactly the issue, Kevin Rose is getting dollars for shuttering an unsuccessful web service. Why does Kevin Rose get to cash out for being a failure, simply because his name is Kevin Rose, while all the hardworking nobody engineers slave away to build successful companies without any help or millions of dollars splashing down on them for their supposed greatness which is unsupported by evidence?
- EnderMB 15y agoWasn't Rose the main guy who pushed Digg over the cliff and over to Reddit with the famed v4 disaster? Don't get me wrong, the guy did great work getting Digg to where it was, but if he was behind Digg v4 he killed it within a matter of days over a decision that no one wanted, and that puts him in a worrying position at Google if he is to work on the social aspects of the company. Didn't he also tank publicly with Pownce? Again a service with functionality that no one really wanted, that turned up at the wrong time and was eaten alive by the likes of Twitter. In many ways these high profile failures could be a great thing for him and Google, because the best lessons comes from those who have been there and lost it all. His acquisition could stop Google from its own "v4" moment.
- Kilimanjaro 15y agoLet the guy work, let the market evaluate his results.
- jlongster 15y agoI think the term everyone here is looking for is "overrated". If you really think he is, stop talking about him and go on with your business. You're giving him the attention that you claim he doesn't deserve.
- ThomBush 15y agoAn important question is whether Kevin will thrive in Google's environment. I imagine they've promised him quite a bit of autonomy, but what happens when Kevin feels constrained or governed? Will he succeed on a very personal level when he wakes up knowing that he's earning a salary from Google instead of continuing to create his own? I sincerely hope he does succeed.
- pknerd 15y agoSo he collected consumer data from OInk and shut it by calling it test app and now joined Google. Google loves data Hope you all got it
- jmacd 15y agoSay what you want but Milk has a tight team that is capable of turning out high quality apps. When you compare this to the $100m+ that (supposedly) offered Path and the $220m+ they paid for Slide then this seems like a steal. Honestly, they are paying pennies for a team that they KNOW can produce solid product and have the personalities and operating capability to do it in a tougher environment. Adding Kevin's celebrity and understanding of social and marketing is a huge bonus that will help G+.
- rokhayakebe 15y agoGuys, please stop being so mean.
- waldes 15y agoGood for him! I've been a fan since tech TV days. I think this board is suffering from an overdose of hateraid. Yeah Digg blew up and then sunk, but to be involved in so many sucessful businesses this guy is talented.
- amorphid 15y agoAgreed. I met Kevin at a launch party a couple years ago. Upon seeing him, my first thought was "Hey, it's the Dark Tipper!" I prefer to focus on someone's positive traits. The fact that Kevin still works and tries to make a difference is admirable. Even if Digg is his only big hit, that's still an impressive accomlishment.
- unreal37 15y agoThe allthingsd article specifically says Google is NOT acquiring Milk. They have hired Kevin Rose and a few key members of the Milk team. The techcrunch article says Milk is being acqui-hired, for $15-$30 million. I wonder which is correct. It's nice to see the investors taken care of, if that's what happened. But it doesn't sound like Milk or Oink will survive past today. Congrats to Kevin and all who were hired. I still stand by my position that it kinda sucks that they abandoned their customers at the drop of the hat. But at least now it makes some sense.
- AtTheLast 15y agoGoogle+ is not cool. It might be a better product then Facebook, but when it comes to social you need a network of people to make a product fly. I see the hiring of Rose as an attempt to give Google+ some street cred and make it cool.
- mark_l_watson 15y agoThis might work out. I find G+ to be much more valuable than FB, and a bit more valuable than Twitter. Hiring a non-engineer who brings new ideas to G+ seems like a good idea, at least for a while.
- dsolomon 15y agoTalk about Google scraping the bottom of the barrel. "Remember, digg failed because it alienated the users, attempted to wrap too much UI around the content; limiting the consumption rate, and pandering to media channels." Bingo. Unless users fell in lock-step with Kevin Rose's thoughts he'd institute the ban hammer.
- callmeed 15y agoOh, look ... they received an investment from Google Ventures. What a coincidence. http://www.crunchbase.com/company/milk http://www.crunchbase.com/company/milk
- jrockway 15y agoI detect that you bring this to our attention because it's bad in some way, but I don't get why. Google invested in his company. Now he works at Google (with 30,000 other people). Who cares? Why is this good or bad?
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- taylorbuley 15y agoWas "we're going to build apps until one hits" smoke and mirrors for "we're going to build a portfolio that can be bought out?"
- moreorless 15y agoSerious question. Who is Kevin Rose and why should we care?
- xxiao 15y agoi don't like that guy, who digged himself on his digg site frequently.
- robryan 15y agoWill be interesting to see of they are all assigned to current efforts like G+ or if they are given some independence and freedom like the slide team. Probably assigned to current efforts as it seemed some slide base efforts in Google were fairly half baked.
- deltriggah 15y agoKevin Rose IS the product
- joelmaat 15y agoI'm simply surprised that Google would do this, but I guess there was a foreshadow in early November when Google Ventures invested. I don't know what they expect to come of this move, but I'm actually, all else aside, wanting for this Google+ thing to work out. I'm actually still a fan. As for Kevin Rose, sometimes I listen to him speak and it seems like he's on the ball and has his finger on the pulse, and at other times he just sounds dumb. I was a little bit unsure if he had an in-depth understanding of what was really going on or if he was just sounding the part, but after listening to his webcam pitch and seeing the subpar Digg v4 that came of that line of thinking, I'm going to say he doesn't really understand a thing. But maybe that doesn't matter, because knowing the Google monster he'll probably be nothing more than a pawn. Time will tell. On another note, Google+'s problems are really really obvious to me, so I'm at a loss at to why they don't just fix things. Maybe they are trying to "stage the rollout to minimize how much they spook people," but then again what sounds reasonable and true is often reduced to nothing more than another line of politics driven BS'ing with these people. Just get on with it already! I have no problem with the Milk team getting an exit. I am not one to be jealous of anything like that. And all this talk about Engineer-entrepreneurs working their ass off for years and not getting anywhere doesn't make me shed a tear either. There are a few Engineers for whom things just didn't work out, but by and large if you were working on something that long and had nothing come of it, then put the hard work aside-- your product/business/positioning sucked! Get over it.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- emeltzer 15y agoAll of you who are saying things in judgement of Kevin Rose's behavior, have some perspective. This is the planet you live on: http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/earth-1.jpg http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/earth-1.jpg It has lots of problems, waiting for good solutions. Instead of explaining the nuances of your latest opinion of Kevin Rose, get up, and start fixing things!
- z0ot 15y agoAre they trying to drive more people away from Google+ or something??
- eta_carinae 15y agoI predict he will leave Google to create a new start up within twelve months.
- woodall 15y agoLike I said before[1], what is up with all this Kevin Rose hate? He has a successful portfolio, seems to have a level head, and knows about tech. All this whining about "well I'm a dev and need VC why do they give him to him?" stop thinking you deserve something and get out there and make something; like he has been proven to do time and time again. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3705015 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3705015
- phatbyte 15y agoNever saw so much jealousy/flaming targeting one person here on HN. I got to say I'm a little disappointed as member of this community. I'm pretty sure Google didn't hired him just for his pretty eyes or the 'cool' factor. Specially when 99% of these comments don't know jack of what they are saying.
- aragorn84 15y agoTime to short GOOG ...