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Early pictures from the days when PayPal was a startup
- australis 14y agohttp://www.levchin.com/paypal-slideshow/index.html http://www.levchin.com/paypal-slideshow/index.html here is the intended splash page, provides a bit of context. interesting photos and commentary - makes it seem like it happened so long ago (i guess it did...)
- kinkora 14y agoif neither of you picked it out, steve chen (of youtube fame) used to work for Paypal before starting youtube and you can spot him on this slide: http://www.levchin.com/paypal-slideshow/3.html http://www.levchin.com/paypal-slideshow/3.html
- mmahemoff 14y ago"Steve Chen (another coder)"
- dangrossman 14y agoYou can pick almost any well-known startup of the last 10 years and find a connection to one of PayPal's founders -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia#Membership http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia#Membership
- fpp 14y agoWhen you want to know what happened to many of the others pictured there (besides Levchin), lookup PayPal Mafia on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia
- ovi256 14y agoElon Musk is being amazing again. He's not busy enough with Tesla and Space X, he's working on bullet-train in a vacuum tunnel tech: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperloop http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperloop
- shorttime 14y agoThat's insane, this guy has his hands in everything. I believe he's also had his hand in solar energy (SolarCity), and was involved in PayPal. Just reading his wiki and apparently he can even beat Russia's Putin in Judo. I usually take everyone's success with a grain of salt but this guy seems to have it all. Real Life Tony Stark?
- pilgrim689 14y agoIt's the other way around :P (http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1984685_1984745_1985495,00.html http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1...)
- chayesfss 14y agoI remember creating my account and linking my bank account to my paypal account. Seemed like the future, then ebay had to buy it. Now I don't have any of my bank/credit cards linked to it and actually put in my credit card info for each thing I purchase or subscribe to on the internet.
- mmahemoff 14y agoLooking at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal_Mafia, it's striking that YouTube and many other companies may have been eBay's greatest (unintended) contribution.
- stephenhuey 14y agoWhen my cousin Kenny told me about how he was starting Paypal, I was fresh off the boat from high school in Nigeria and had barely begun using the internet, so this sounded very magical. And it truly was, because it really felt futuristic when college friends would pay each other back by giving cash online. When I proudly told them my cousin was at Paypal, it impressed the non-geeks just as much as the geeks because it was so easy for everyone to sense the impact of this technology.
- yuhong 14y agoYea, eventually eBay finally paid attention and that was how David Marcus was hired from the startup world (I was thinking this was a good idea for a while now): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4494216 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4494216
- webmonkeyuk 14y agoThis post has done the rounds on here a few times now: http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=levchin.com&start=0 http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=levchin.com... http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2552860 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2552860 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20085 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20085
- mkr-hn 14y agoWhat's your point? I haven't seen it before, so I'm glad it's reposted periodically.
- thehigherlife 14y agoI can't speak specifically for him, but maybe he was being nice and providing the other threads so that you could peruse them.
- mkr-hn 14y agoThat kind of thing is usually prefaced with something like "here's some other interesting discussions on this." But maybe I'm wrong and webmonkeyuk had good intentions.
- webmonkeyuk 14y agoNo point, read into it whatever negativity you want :)
- tzz 14y agoIf it is helps, all in single page: http://all.fuseurl.com/eeo http://all.fuseurl.com/eeo
- pilgrim689 14y agoHow come I don't see Elon Musk in any of these pictures? I don't know much of PayPal history, but didn't he co-found it?
- salimmadjd 14y agoAs I understand it, Elon had massive plastic surgery and was never happy with his looks so you rarely see old photos of him, and if you do you can't tell it's him
- encoderer 14y agoMusk founded X.com which merged into PayPal very early.
- JackWebbHeller 14y agoMaybe Elon was a really keen photographer.
- salimmadjd 14y agoHere's a photo of musk with theil and bringing x.com. This is before Musk had his cosmetic work done, http://www.stepbrother.co.za/tech7.html http://www.stepbrother.co.za/tech7.html
- JackWebbHeller 14y agoHave you got a source on the whole plastic surgery thing? The difference between the two photos just looks like a man who grew into his looks and got took onboard some style advice.
- salimmadjd 14y agoup-vote for the fair question. I was under the impression that information was common knowledge among SV elites. The person who initially told me was close to paypal people. How this came about it went something like this: me - Hey I noticed earlier photos of Musk and he looks so different. the other person - oh yeah, this whole surgery thing was known among some paypal people I know.... Ignoring the above conversation. His facial changes are sort of going against the pattern of aging. 1 - his receding hairline (starting 10 years ago) is reversing and it's almost gone now. http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/201/elonbeforeafter.jpg http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/201/elonbeforeafter.jpg 2 - usually people go from high cheekbone to rounded face as they age not usually the reverse. http://www.stepbrother.co.za/images/musk2.jpg http://www.stepbrother.co.za/images/musk2.jpg also the scar just under his left eye is not there anymore http://www.inc.com/uploaded_files/image/feature-80-Musk-1-pan_5343.jpg http://www.inc.com/uploaded_files/image/feature-80-Musk-1-pa... That said, I'm rather embarrassed for posting this and reply to your comment. But I find it intriguing what you need to do as a visionary since image is everything and there is probably something we can all learn from this.
- TallboyOne 14y agoThis post makes me really bittersweet, bordering on emo. During that period I was just a wee lad that couldnt get ENOUGH of the computer... I was programming and doing all sorts of things. Stupid stupid stupid me never even thought to try to do online advertising or making a website that catered to an idea. Instead I dicked around with video game websites (which actually got a huge following but died off when the game did), small game development and 3d design. I regret that to this day, I would undoubtedly be in a different spot had I used my very good talents with the end goal of making a profit in mind. Now all these years later it seems like I'm in the same position as everyone else, whereas then I realized the insane potential of the internet yet my idiot brain never put 2+2 together with the idea of money.
- brador 14y agoYou mentioned gaming sites, games and 3d modelling as weak choices...what do you think would have made better avenues, given the tech at the time?
- TallboyOne 14y agoWell they were obviously good choices for john carmack and others. For just me though, being a solo person, developing 3d models didnt really help me make money. Granted, it gave me a huge understanding of complex topics at a young age which saturated my interest and allowed me to pursue my obsession and do a number of successful technical things later, but my focus just wasn't quite there. It was 90% there, but not the 10% that it needed. It is difficult to explain.. For example, I used to do media buying. Back then, it was too easy to make money via online advertising. Any halfwitted idea would yields you tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. I actually owned a site dedicated to games that had a HUGE amount of visitors, and yet it never occured to me to put ads on it (not just putting ads on my site either, but pursuing online advertising ventures). I also could have easily made and promoted some sites to fill certain niches given certain circles I was a part of (back then there were so many ideas not yet put into place). Instead it just didn't occur to me. I have a lot of friends that started half-assed ideas back then in that era and now have millions of dollars. Thats not to say no skill was involved, it was just the chances then were MUCH higher than now, almost to the point where if you started then you probably would have something to show for it by now, if you were even halfway tactful with your strategies and implementation - which is something I know I could have been. EDIT: I'm not talking strictly about the paypal era I suppose, my mind is drifting to a bit earlier, in the days of google being new, etc.
- aresant 14y agoHard to believe that as recently as 1999 the lack of ubiquitous camera-phones meant that images like this are rare / remarkable. You can see in the photo properties several are taken with a Sony Cybershot - eg somebody had to have the forethought to drag out an actual, gasp, camera to document these events. In the context of this photo essay that means that many of the photos are either posed or around "events" where a camera would likely be welcome - IPO celebration, work parties, etc. So what's mostly missing here - and everybody's photo albums of that era - are much of the unexpected, the spontaneous, etc.
- Skroob 14y agoA nice little piece of history. It's easy to forget how PayPal used to be a darling company instead of a pariah.
- LarrySDonald 14y agoI remember it well. It seemed like such a solid idea - be able to send money to anyone with only both parties responsibility for what it was, just like handing cash over. I pushed it hard at the time, figuring it was the best bet for being able to finally do transaction freely. Three years later, yeah. You can send cash to anyone. Except, you know.. anyone dealing in drugs. Or porn. Or gambling. Or potentially illegal electronics. Or hebs. But anyone else. Well, not you personally - we dislike you already so for you, no one, but other people might..
- jseliger 14y agoYears ago I made the mistake of using them. Never again. Their habit of screwing users, followed by complete opacity as to why they're screwing a particular user at a particular time, makes them evil. Which is really too bad: they provide what could be, in other circumstances, a useful service. I actually sued them in small claims court.
- leeskye 14y agoIs it me or does Thiel look like a younger version of PG in this pic?
- gsibble 14y agoCan someone explain something for me? Elon Musk made approximately $110m from the purchase of PayPal from eBay in 2002. His Wikipedia page states that he is worth $2.4B. Where did the other 95% of his wealth come from?
- teflonhook 14y agoHe sold zip2 for $300m before this and owns shares in the companies he founded subsequently; Tesla, Space X and Solar City