Live data from Hacker News

What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

hackingdistributed.com

1–10 of 288 posts

Re: What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

#3

Yahoo didn't buy the technology, they purchased the talent. Talent that knows how to reach an audience. You can always get high quality engineers to figure out the rest...

The article's main point is that the founders didn't do anything really noteworthy, technologically speaking, and so Yahoo overpaid for the talent in question.

Re: What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

#4

Yahoo didn't buy the technology, they purchased the talent. Talent that knows how to reach an audience. You can always get high quality engineers to figure out the rest...

I have some rather strong misgivings when purchased talent != high quality engineers where software product/company acquisitions are concerned.

There are some excellent professionals out there with a far more rigorously proven and solid track record of knowing how to reach an audience. You're suggesting the 17-yr-old & 2 compatriots have proven themselves to possess $30-million-worth of reaching-an-audience skill?

[edit: spelling]

Re: What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

#5
I think the author makes this comment:

"Summly's entire business model seems to revolve around catering to this demographic. Frankly, it pains me."

I reads like a critique of Chubby Checker's "Twist" from a professor a Julliard. Perhaps, and I say that because I can't know what they were really thinking, but perhaps that was the point. This company had successfully "catered to this demographic" (which was defined as young hipster like brogrammers) and while those guys drink their PBR and deck out their mancaves perhaps it is a demographic that Yahoo desperately wants to reach? Maybe the whole point was that Yahoo folks were building things for middle-aged dot boomers and not for the cool kids.

Maybe the goal was to get more people who could quickly assemble a MVP from existing APIs that appealed to the emerging cohort of buyers and trendsetters. Maybe NLP wasn't the point.

Re: What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

#6
From his own quoted post: "I lived through 8 years of a non-reading president along with everyone else. I know that the brogrammers out there are constantly getting texts from their buddies to plan the weekend's broactivities..."

Thanks Professor, now I don't have to continue reading your post – ie, you're kind of a jerk.

Re: What's Actually Wrong with Yahoo's Purchase of Summly

#8
post #3

Yahoo didn't buy the technology, they purchased the talent. Talent that knows how to reach an audience. You can always get high quality engineers to figure out the rest...

The article's main point is that the founders didn't do anything really noteworthy, technologically speaking, and so Yahoo overpaid for the talent in question.

>the founders didn't do anything really noteworthy

1M+ downloads for an app with licensed technology is noteworthy.

Post reply on HN