Facebook buys Gowalla • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#71

Post by lupatus » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 6:35 AM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #70

harryh wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A) They haven't really been a competitor for a long time. Once you're beating someone by a factor of over 100:1 you move on to other things. B) Facebook isn't buying the product (they don't care about the product). They're just hiring a couple of engineers/designers/product folks.

[deleted]

Lots of people seem to gain fame by following this maxim: If you say anything that can be construed as dickish, lots of people will talk about you.

Exhibit A: Simon Cowell Exhibit B: Donald Trump Exhibit C: RMS

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#72

Post by spullara » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 6:50 AM UTC

hkarthik wrote: post #13

Gowalla's been doing some interesting things with Cassandra, so this sounds like a great fit. Congrats to all involved!

Facebook has pretty much moved everything from Cassandra to HBase at this point.

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#73

Post by gujk » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 7:44 AM UTC

oldstrangers wrote: post #58

pmf wrote: post #49

Facebook has now the best design team in the valley. Hands down. Gowalla plus Made by Sofa plus Push Pop Press

Facebook does have a solid design team, but I wonder where all that talent is being directed? Visually, their hires in the past year or so haven't made an impact with facebook.com. At least with Google's new design team, you can see what they're doing. So, one has to ask, what are these people working on? A facebook phone? Facebook X.0?

If the Facebook's new designers do nothing new at all, but they hold the line against Google-style insane UX-destroying experimentation, they will be incredibly valuable.

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#74

Post by drewcrawford » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 7:50 AM UTC

moses1400 wrote: post #37

kainosnoema wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is definitely a big loss for Austin. There are still a few interesting startups in the area, but Gowalla was the one that made it a serious contender.

I moved my company to Austin from NYC a year ago. Not one event have I been to where Gowalla was mentioned.

What company and where in Austin? (There's no info in your profile or comment history). I'm always looking to meet local entrepreneurs.

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#75

Post by pbreit » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 8:11 AM UTC

What ever happened to Gowalla's first product, the game Alamo Fire?

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#76

Post by lawrence » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 8:58 AM UTC

gsiener wrote: post #50

lawrence wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this is an interesting topic. Why did Foursquare win? Was it anti-cheating provisions that were too strict in the early days? New York vs. Austin? Better PR? Simpler product? Dodgeball users as jumpstart? Who knows. One thing we do know was that it wasn't money.

I think it's pretty clear that Dennis Crowley has been thinking about this problem space for more than a decade, and foursquare is the third (fourth?) iteration on his original vision.

Agree, but not sure what that has to do with execution. More passion? More expertise? You think that's why 4sq won?

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#77

Post by tbrooks » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 9:38 AM UTC

kainosnoema wrote: post #14

elbenshira wrote: post #7

I remember an article about how Gowalla was bringing SV talent to Austin. Heh.

This is definitely a big loss for Austin. There are still a few interesting startups in the area, but Gowalla was the one that made it a serious contender.

How is this a big loss for Austin?

Gowalla isn't involved in the community.

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#78

Post by simonw » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 9:42 AM UTC

deathwarmedover wrote: post #48

simanyay wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook does only talent acquisitions. They never buy products.

Facebook used parts of FriendFeed actively after acquiring them: https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/301/

Do Facebook use Tornado internally, on anything other than FriendFeed.com?

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#79

Post by MrJagil » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 9:43 AM UTC

lawrence wrote: post #47

bmac27 wrote: post #26

It was a very elegantly designed product; cleaner, crisper design than Foursquare's was in my opinion. But I always had difficulty checking in. I literally had to be inside a venue to register a check-in; and even then it was finicky. 30 feet away? Forget it.

Yeah, this is an interesting topic. Why did Foursquare win? Was it anti-cheating provisions that were too strict in the early days? New York vs. Austin? Better PR? Simpler product? Dodgeball users as jumpstart? Who knows. One thing we do know was that it wasn't money.

To make it even more spicy, according to wikipedia, Gowalla actually launched 2 years prior to foursquare[1]. Dodgeball was founded in 2000.

[1]The article says 2009, wikipedia says 2007?

Re: Facebook buys Gowalla

#80

Post by simonw » Sat, Dec 03, 2011, 9:45 AM UTC

lawrence wrote: post #47

bmac27 wrote: post #26

It was a very elegantly designed product; cleaner, crisper design than Foursquare's was in my opinion. But I always had difficulty checking in. I literally had to be inside a venue to register a check-in; and even then it was finicky. 30 feet away? Forget it.

Yeah, this is an interesting topic. Why did Foursquare win? Was it anti-cheating provisions that were too strict in the early days? New York vs. Austin? Better PR? Simpler product? Dodgeball users as jumpstart? Who knows. One thing we do know was that it wasn't money.

Why do you think money wasn't a factor? Foursquare raised significantly more than Gowalla (according to Crunchbase, $71m vs $10m), and as a result grew a much larger team and presumably spent a lot more on marketing.