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This has very little to do with national moods/prejudices and much more to do with boring/atypical industries vs. hot consumer ones. ONO got no attention largel

This has very little to do with national moods/prejudices and much more to do with boring/atypical industries vs. hot consumer ones. ONO got no attention largely because it's "boring" to a mass audience. There are plenty of examples of this domestically, e.g. + Child focused ecommerce company Zulily filed a $2.6B IPO, but got very little attention. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6740927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6740927 I'd also note that there are blinders even within the startup community. I've submitted plenty of stories about under-the-radar startups that die on the vine because the companies are more focused on execution that cultivating a PR rep that would earn media and upvotes. + Wayfair, a bootstrapped ecommerce company raised $165MM in its "Series A" and barely got a notice here on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3625381 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3625381 + Here's another example of HN blindness: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3625381 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3625381 + Nearly a quarter of the top 20 projects on Kickstarter are board games—can you remember the last story you read about one? A couple have raised more than Oculus Rift or Formlabs, but get no attention because they're "boring," while these hardware cos earn magazine covers and lavish praise. + Mailchimp is easily a $100MM+ in revenue company that was bootstrapped, but they're rarely profiled. The reality is the tech news reported by most of the big names is just the most "exciting" tip of the iceberg. There are plenty of worthy stories that just won't generate page views and hence don't get the attention they "deserve," if coverage was apportioned by success measured in dollars or reach rather than pageviews.

omegant 13y ago
I think that Martin is refering to the attention that the wasup adquisition had here in Spain and how little is getting in the spanish media, a Spanish start up that's selling for that amount.
- taylorbuley 13y ago
  It's easy to blame media "blindness" and inattention -- here, apparently both in Spain and on the wider Web -- but to me it just boils down to the economics of attention. If the author is right and "nobody cares" then the lack of press is pretty explainable. In today's ad-driven world, journalists are tacitly rewarded (at the very least) for Web traffic. As such, the coveted beats are the ones that drive guaranteed interest -- Apple being the traffic gorilla when I was a staff writer. The stuff closest to consumers (porcelain) on the whole drive more interest than infrastructure (plumbing). Starting out in the Valley I got beats like Seagate and storage (after getting the assignment, another editor joked that it was "borage"). I remember envying the consumer electronics writers for their traffic, but was always more of a pluming guy myself.
nemothekid 13y ago
Holy hell, Karmaloop is eyeing an IPO? That's insane, they were always this street wear boutique to me.
judk 13y ago
> Nearly a quarter of the top 20 projects So, a fifth?
gmazzotti 13y ago
I completly agree with this: When Tuenti (the Facebook of Spain) was sold it was very very covered in the press (in Spain and in all Europe) although it was “only” a 70MM adquisition, as you say, is not how big is the sucesss or how much money is done, is how boring or how popular the startup is what makes how much cover the news get.
mgirdley 13y ago
Notice the pattern of blindness: If something ain't happening in one of big tech hubs (SF, NYC), it's invisible to the media.
- alaskamiller 13y ago
  Seems like you're still not quite getting this. News happen because the community around it want it to happen, because news is a signal to be broadcasted only if there's a medium in which to broadcast. It's one big circlejerk. I can't do bizdev with some company far away.
the_cat_kittles 13y ago
nice comment- how do you stay apprised of these in light of the media bias towards the "sexy", are there any websites, youtube channels or blogs that are good for this kind of information? thanks!

omegant 13y ago

I think that Martin is refering to the attention that the wasup adquisition had here in Spain and how little is getting in the spanish media, a Spanish start up that's selling for that amount.

taylorbuley 13y ago
It's easy to blame media "blindness" and inattention -- here, apparently both in Spain and on the wider Web -- but to me it just boils down to the economics of attention. If the author is right and "nobody cares" then the lack of press is pretty explainable. In today's ad-driven world, journalists are tacitly rewarded (at the very least) for Web traffic. As such, the coveted beats are the ones that drive guaranteed interest -- Apple being the traffic gorilla when I was a staff writer. The stuff closest to consumers (porcelain) on the whole drive more interest than infrastructure (plumbing). Starting out in the Valley I got beats like Seagate and storage (after getting the assignment, another editor joked that it was "borage"). I remember envying the consumer electronics writers for their traffic, but was always more of a pluming guy myself.

nemothekid 13y ago

Holy hell, Karmaloop is eyeing an IPO? That's insane, they were always this street wear boutique to me.

judk 13y ago

> Nearly a quarter of the top 20 projects So, a fifth?

gmazzotti 13y ago

I completly agree with this: When Tuenti (the Facebook of Spain) was sold it was very very covered in the press (in Spain and in all Europe) although it was “only” a 70MM adquisition, as you say, is not how big is the sucesss or how much money is done, is how boring or how popular the startup is what makes how much cover the news get.

mgirdley 13y ago

Notice the pattern of blindness: If something ain't happening in one of big tech hubs (SF, NYC), it's invisible to the media.

alaskamiller 13y ago
Seems like you're still not quite getting this. News happen because the community around it want it to happen, because news is a signal to be broadcasted only if there's a medium in which to broadcast. It's one big circlejerk. I can't do bizdev with some company far away.

the_cat_kittles 13y ago

nice comment- how do you stay apprised of these in light of the media bias towards the "sexy", are there any websites, youtube channels or blogs that are good for this kind of information? thanks!