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WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

forbes.com

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Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#321

Post by forgingahead »

If you think about it, there was no other way this could have played out. Acton (and maybe Koum) are privacy idealists, but could never have gone to the next level of philanthropy via massive wealth just by organic Whatsapp growth and revenue.

They needed the FB acquisition to supercharge their wallets, needed the pound of flesh to be demanded for the price that was paid in order to revisit their original mission, and now we're seeing Acton at least refocus on easy-to-use encrypted communications via Signal and potentially other platforms. The FB money has allowed for potentially more investments in the privacy tools sphere, if Acton continues his work in that area.

Whatsapp is a massively dominant messaging service, but the drive for privacy amongst consumers will continue to increase. It'll be interesting to see how we all communicate with the next evolution of all these apps in 10 years.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#322

Post by mcny »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #293
mattnewport wrote: post #7

This article seems a little unfair to the WhatsApp founders when it suggests they should have known that any assurances Facebook made to them as part of the acquisition were obviously lies. Sure in 2018 it might be obvious to most of us that nothing Facebook says or promises can be trusted but I don't think that was necessarily as obvious when the acquisition happened and they can be forgiven for thinking they weren'…

To be fair acquisition assurances are always temporary at best. They are buying the company for a reason, not to leave it alone forever. I've been a part of two acquisitions over the past decade and most of the devs I know have been in at least one. The assurances are never more than temporary. This seems less Facebook specific and more "that's simply what happens with all acquisitions".

> To be fair acquisition assurances are always temporary at best. They are buying the company for a reason, not to leave it alone forever. I've been a part of two acquisitions over the past decade and most of the devs I know have been in at least one. The assurances are never more than temporary.

> This seems less Facebook specific and more "that's simply what happens with all acquisitions".

I don't know what was going through their heads but as an outsider with no insider knowledge, I justified this as Facebook making sure nobody else gets hold of Whatsapp's user base. It made sense in my head back then.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#323

Post by mrnobody_67 »

jerguismi wrote: post #250

So... Basically he cashed out billions. That is ridiculous amount of money. Now he said "no" to $850 millions for moral reasons, and the moral action here is mostly that he won't work for facebook any more. For me this sounds quite ridiculous. He already cashed out as they sold the unprofitable service for ridiculous amount of money. Facebook has to generate profit for shareholders so they have to monetize it somehow…

Should've taken the $850m and invested in 50 potential FB competitors... or start a foundation.

Not taking the money just enriches the FB management and shareholders, thus rewarding them to continue what they are already doing.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#324

Post by macspoofing »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #293
mattnewport wrote: post #7

This article seems a little unfair to the WhatsApp founders when it suggests they should have known that any assurances Facebook made to them as part of the acquisition were obviously lies. Sure in 2018 it might be obvious to most of us that nothing Facebook says or promises can be trusted but I don't think that was necessarily as obvious when the acquisition happened and they can be forgiven for thinking they weren'…

To be fair acquisition assurances are always temporary at best. They are buying the company for a reason, not to leave it alone forever. I've been a part of two acquisitions over the past decade and most of the devs I know have been in at least one. The assurances are never more than temporary. This seems less Facebook specific and more "that's simply what happens with all acquisitions".

>The assurances are never more than temporary.

Yep. 2 years. That's usually the amount time that an acquirer will leave you be.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#326

Post by macspoofing »

ohazi wrote: post #171
Illniyar wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a reasonable position in response from an employee trying to "activate a clause written into their contract to allow them to immediately get all their stock if the company began “implementing monetization initiatives” without their consent" . Now whether or not he was in the right to demand it, when actually doing so I doubt anyone expected to have a working relationship after that.

In a vacuum, perhaps, but I think there's more to it than that. Another account yesterday mentioned plans to put Kevin Systrom under a different manager that would have given him "less access to Zuckerberg." Earlier accounts described them as friendly, always seen together, etc. It seems like Facebook is a company where access to the CEO is so tightly controlled that it's basically used as a political weapon.

>It seems like Facebook is a company where access to the CEO is so tightly controlled that it's basically used as a political weapon.

Is it different at any other Fortune 50 company? At that scale, the companies are basically nations.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#327

Post by colordrops »

mattnewport wrote: post #7

This article seems a little unfair to the WhatsApp founders when it suggests they should have known that any assurances Facebook made to them as part of the acquisition were obviously lies. Sure in 2018 it might be obvious to most of us that nothing Facebook says or promises can be trusted but I don't think that was necessarily as obvious when the acquisition happened and they can be forgiven for thinking they weren'…

The movie "The Social Network" came out in 2010 for goodness sake. It was already mainstream knowledge among non-tech people in 2010, let alone successful tech billionaires in 2014, that Facebook was an organization run by sociopaths.

Re: WhatsApp Cofounder Brian Acton on Why He Left $850M Behind

#328

Post by curun1r »

madrox wrote: post #316
jonas21 wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The indignant tone of the comments here make me laugh. Yeah, the level of indignation and self-righteousness in the comments on HN (and not just in this thread) seems to have gotten worse lately. Maybe time for me to take a break from HN for a bit...

I've been seeing the same thing...not just in HN, but across tech. My theory is there's a lot of resentment of the successful. We're seeing a new generation of engineers enter the workforce that never got to participate in the previous booms, and it's not as easy to make it big as it used to be.

> it's not as easy to make it big as it used to be

What? It's so much easier than it used to be. Between low interest rates, QE policies and the latest corporate tax cuts, equity markets are booming and it's easier than ever to get bought. And the actual process of building a company is also easier. Between accelerators like YC and Cloud providers, the path from idea to getting acquired is shorter than it's ever been. You just have to adjust the goal posts a bit. It's may be harder now to IPO and become and independent company with the outsized influence of one of the FANGs, but achieving generational wealth by being acquired by one of those companies is routinely done in just a few years.

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