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The One-Person Product
- lifeisstillgood 13y agoNice to peak behind the curtains - thank you. Edit: deleted unnecessary commentary
- webwanderings 13y ago$6.2 million http://business.time.com/2013/05/21/inside-yahoos-tumblr-deal-heres-who-hit-the-billion-dollar-jackpot/ http://business.time.com/2013/05/21/inside-yahoos-tumblr-dea...
- rayvinly 13y agoFlickr looks pretty good now. I think charging more for power users will work out pretty well for Flickr. So I hope Tumblr will be similar.
- wprl 13y agoI'm always happy for other coders who are successful but comparing David to Steve Jobs is a wee bit grandiose.
- pasbesoin 13y agoI still have my doubts, on more than one front, but that was definitely an interesting and worthwhile read. I haven't been part of the Tumblr community -- rather just seeing individual items when they are cited elsewhere -- so this provides a bit of perspective especially as to its genesis.
- Scramblejams 13y ago"Acquisitions on this scale usually work well." I don't know what planet Marco's on -- despite his citation of Youtube, acquisitions hardly ever work well, let alone on this scale. But he does have a habit of writing things with a straight face that other people never would.
- notlisted 13y agoLovely article. Glad to have read it. Suspect Marco is a little modest about his contribution, but great to hear he came out ahead, and then some. Truly hope Tumblr can maintain its independence from the Yahoo hive mind/wholesome image, just like Conde Nast has let Reddit's less-than-family-friendly stuff thrive (smartest decision ever). Despite all that, the $1B valuation is batshit, not unlike the housing market in NYC these days ($1.6MM for his Brooklyn one bedroom?) I'm glad to be escaping the clutched of NYC in several weeks from now. A yard!
- smartial_arts 13y agoIs it just me or it looks like another Instagram/Facebook deal? For sure, they got great payouts, although it seems more like a lottery to me - how many of those swinging for the fences actually manage to do that? And was tumblr ever profitable?
- jph 13y agoCongratulations Marco, to you and your team. Your writeup is great to read-- the history and growth of Tumblr firsthand. I'm excited to see what you all build.
- famousactress 13y agoCurious: What does the day-and-night-iPhone reference mean? [Edit: Genuine thanks for the explanation everyone, but boy am I sorry I asked.]
- aaronbrethorst 13y agohttp://www.vanityfair.com/culture/my-phone/2013/03/dave-morin-path-facebook-apple http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/my-phone/2013/03/dave-mori...
- GBond 13y agoThat interview can't be real. Surely he was satirically making light the whole bro-grammer meme? Right? Hard for me to believe you can condense so much "douchiness" without it being in jest and intentional.
- w1ntermute 13y agoAn excellent Tumblr post breaking down that Vanity Fair interview: http://jesuschristsiliconvalley.tumblr.com/post/46539276780/a-cunt-and-his-iphone http://jesuschristsiliconvalley.tumblr.com/post/46539276780/...
- gfodor 13y agoI never caught the [case] thing. Amazing.
- chetanahuja 13y agoSilicon valley now rivals Hollywood at creating entitled, pampered douchebags. Thank you that anonymous blogger on tumbler at so skillfully capturing that in one brilliant work of deconstruction.
- hkmurakami 13y agoWhat a sad state we find ourselves in. The past decades were by no means free from such poisonous personalities (see: Tyco), but we seem to have reached a whole new level. I guess humility doesn't pay the bills anymore.
- Edmond 13y agowell said... stay smart, you'll live a good life:)
- bestoftimes 13y agoCongrats Marco. You rock and deserve it.
- stevenj 13y agoI know very little about David Karp. But after reading this, I'm a bit surprised that he decided to sell Tumblr. The way Marco talks about David's disinterest in money, and his singular obsession with Tumblr, made me think he wouldn't even consider selling it to someone else. I'd be curious to hear his reasons for selling, as oppose to doing a strategic investment like Facebook did with Microsoft at one point.
- snambi 13y agoI guess everyone gets bored of their passion after a while.
- swamp40 13y agoWhy lock himself in to a 4 year deal, then?
- Y0YO 13y agoI think he was waiting for a billion dollar. That's why he didn't really cared about money at first, but building a billion dollar company.
- vineet 13y agoI believe they were running out of money and needed to do more work to bring revenues appropriately up. Yahoo allows them to not need to focus on revenues, as they already have a large and established an ad sales team.
- hkmurakami 13y agoIn contrast, another VC round surely would have forced them to focus on revenues, perhaps even at the expense of user experience and product quality.
- sliverstorm 13y agoNot to mention, could they get a favorable VC round given their poor revenues?
- sergiotapia 13y agoI like reading this guys blog, it's well written and weaves a nice story to follow almost always. It's a shame a lot of the Tumblr crowd are like this: http://www.reddit.com/r/tumblrinaction http://www.reddit.com/r/tumblrinaction The technology seems great and simple to use.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- bitwize 13y agoThe technology seems great and simple to use. There's a reason why I call it "Fumblr". To me the user interface is hella cumbersome. But I spend much of my day inside Emacs, so...
- reeses 13y agoIf you spend all your time inside emacs[1], you know that you can change anything you consider less-than-ideal. If you can't, or don't feel enough pain to make it worthwhile, the original rule 34 (which is really just rule #1, in the way that 'water is wet') will lead you to someone who has made an emacs package for it. http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/Tumblr http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/Tumblr [1] Because, as we all know, Linux/Windows/OS X/QNX/Solaris/etc. are just bootloaders for the true GNU operating system.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- guelo 13y agoThat actually makes me more wary of reddit than tumblr. For others, the llinked-to reddit seems to be mostly about laughing at and sometimes harassing people on tumblr that have pride in alternative lifestyles or viewpoints.
- jimzvz 13y ago...alternative lifestyles or viewpoints. This kind of "alterative lifestyle or viewpoint" is pretty scary: http://factcheckme.wordpress.com/2013/05/19/moron-creativity/#comment-16062 http://factcheckme.wordpress.com/2013/05/19/moron-creativity... http://www.reddit.com/r/TumblrInAction/comments/1er18l/not_tumblr_but_honestly_the_craziest_thing_ive/ http://www.reddit.com/r/TumblrInAction/comments/1er18l/not_t...
- clamprecht 13y agoThe post says he won't make "yacht-and-helicopter money"... I think helicopters are cheaper than he thinks. On a billion-dollar acquisition, I can't imagine the near-cofounder having less than 1% (hopefully quite a bit more). This means at least $10M, which should be plenty for a helicopter. Maybe I'm reading his comment too literally.
- randallsquared 13y agoWell, lots of brand new yachts can be had for mere hundreds of thousands, too. I don't think Marco has actually priced them. :)
- Moto7451 13y agoDock fees, fuel repair costs, insurance, and the salary for a licensed captain if your Yacht is over a certain size add up. Boats are not cheap. Even "small" (anyone with a automobile license can drive it) 40ft ones. My buddy's family owns a 45 ft Yacht and the joke at the harbor is BOAT = Break Out Another Thousand. Where they dock it they pay $10 per foot per month in dock fees which is cheap for the area. 5 miles down the coast it's $30/foot/month.
- jonknee 13y agoReminds me of the adage that a boat is a hole in the water that you throw money into.
- calhoun137 13y agoOr the one that says owning a boat only makes you happy two times: when you buy it and when you sell it.
- airblade 13y agoOr that yachting is like standing under a cold shower tearing up £50 notes.
- Aco- 13y agoWell I guess that answers how marco is doing RE: post acquisition
- rodolphoarruda 13y agoCongratulations, Marco! Well done! And thanks for sharing the story. Very inspiring, at least for me, at the moment I'm living now.
- anon808 13y agoMarco makes a lot of Steve Jobs comparisons in the write up, genuinely curious, did he work with Steve Jobs?
- billforsternz 13y agoNo, he did not. If you listen to his podcasts Marco's career is an open book. Basically, college -> unremarkable first job -> Tumblr employee nbr 2 -> Instapaper -> The Magazine.
- epochwolf 13y agoWhile making money on doing podcasts and a blog on the side.
- billforsternz 13y agoYes but they are predicated on his successful career.
- ghshephard 13y agoIf he doesn't get founder status, then at the very least we have to give him "Tumblr Employee nbr 1" status.
- Sealy 13y agoAn inspiring story written in a humble perspective. A story of keeping focus in the face of funding problems that are all too common in early startups. It reminds me of the Facebook story where some of the early founders wanted to introduce advertising very early on.
- jhonovich 13y ago"David would come in with a grand new feature idea, and I’d tell him which parts were infeasible or impossible, which tricky conditions and edge cases we’d need to consider, and which other little niceties and implementation details we should add." David was the lead developer or?
- cliftonk 13y agoCongrats to all the folks at Tumblr
- mikecane 13y ago>>>Even though Tumblr was never a one-person company, it usually felt like a one-person product. That. I didn't stay with Tumblr long -- the limitations eventually got to me -- but I always had the sense this was a product with a personality behind it, not a committee.
- mkoble11 13y agoDavid pushed me to do amazing work that I didn’t think was possible. A quality of a great leader. Phenomenal post, thanks so much for sharing this.
- z-factor 13y ago> A quality of a great leader. That or exaggeration.
- paul9290 13y agoI'm pretty sure Karp announced their funding at the Nov. 2007 New York Tech Meetup, if I recall correctly. That was a darn awesome Tech Meetup (presented my 1st thing there & Marco graciously took pictures of the event, some of me presenting too; thanks Marco) as there were only two unknown start-ups presenting that night amongst giants. Congrats to them!
- mig39 13y agoClassic: "I won’t be switching to dedicated day and night iPhones." hahah!