Live data from Hacker News

IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

twitter.com

81–90 of 207 posts

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Netherlands we use Erbij, ( https://erbij.app ), which is now going international. full disclosure, I'm one of the founders

Never heard about this app. Dont like 'download the app' popups in a time where webapps are perfectly fine. Give me one reason why you want to force users to use the app?

The "Data Sharing" section of the app store listing tells you all you need to know.

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#82
post #5

They recently acquired Meetup as well [1]. This doesn't bode well for its future. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38953242

Speaking of, is there a good replacement for Meetup if you just want to organize some informal activities, like a user group or going biking?

Partiful.com has been pretty good for me

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> people that apply there have quite low moral/ethical ones Out of curiosity, why? It doesn’t seem like these apps are either critical nor need those developers anymore.

You're not really joining a company whose mission is to make the world a better place, or at least just create a nice product. You're joining a team of jackals trying to squeeze any money out of users that depend/love a specific product while putting these applications on minimal support. I just think that at the end of the day it's nicer if you can think you contributed to the world, or even just one user making his…

> You're not really joining a company whose mission is to make the world a better place

cringe

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#84

If you read their Wikipedia page [1] they sound like an Italian Saint. A lot about the various awards they have gotten and other "charitable" activities. But reading the comments here, I get another impression of the company. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bending_Spoons

The wikipedia page has been thoroughly editted today and reads a lot more factual now.

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#85
Investors in Bending Spoons include musician The Weekend, tennis player Andre Agassi, movie star Bradley Cooper, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and director/actor Taika Waititi, among many other famous people: https://bendingspoons.com/people (scroll to the bottom to see all names).

I wonder if any of these illustrious backers are aware of the true business model of Bending Spoons, which can only be described as scammy:

1. Buy apps that have loyal users.

2. Fire all or most of the employees.

3. Update the apps with the most possibly intrusive adware, to milk user data for cash, earning a nice return.

Most users will thoughtlessly tap "OK" when asked to agree to the barrage of new permissions requested by the updated apps.

The company does other things too, but this is its main business.

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#86
post #5

They recently acquired Meetup as well [1]. This doesn't bode well for its future. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38953242

Speaking of, is there a good replacement for Meetup if you just want to organize some informal activities, like a user group or going biking?

My AGPL, micro-federated platform Jonline has support for events with anonymous (or logged in) RSVPs. Still very early, and there are definitely still bugs, but you can deploy yourself and/or contribute!

https://github.com/JonLatane/jonline https://jonline.io https://bullcity.social https://oakcity.social

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#87

Bending Spoons also bough Evernote a while ago. Pretty much doubled the price. With that I thought they could go stuff themselves and went to unsubscribe, but they offered a drastic discount if I didn't. So they managed to keep me for another year. :/ But if they don't get their Python SDK in order soon I might drop them anyway.

Python SDK

LOL ok I'm sure they are going to escalate this to the top. For you, and maybe one other person. :)

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a reference to the Matrix movie

They can choose what they thought they were referencing. They don't get the opportunity to tell others what to infer.

Screw the downvotes: you are correct. References are interpreted, full stop. Bending Spoons is just crappy.

Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired

#90

Calling your company "Bending Spoons" is like calling it "Stealing Chickens" (Context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoon_bending )

Guess in the specific case “Fucking People” would have worked too

Except such a name would be considered inappropriate in a wide range of situations. Also worth pointing out a large number of people enjoy being on the receiving end of penetrative sex.
Post reply on HN