41–46 of 46 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Actually I can see the value for any random middle-manager at a big company whose job involves a bucketload of email correspondance with lots of people outside of the company. That seems like a big enough market to me.
Are random middle-managers at a big company using GMail though? Wouldn't they be using outlook/exchange?
I was confused about some of the jargon in Paul Graham's "The future is no fixed amount, no fixed closing date, and no lead" quote so I looked them up best I could: no lead - A lead investor is basically someone who commits, and says "we're in" at the start of the round. They commit organizational and negotiating resources. They also typically take a board seat. See http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2007/10/the-lead-invest.htm…
no lead = there's no one investor who particularly stands out (e.g. by taking >30% of the round); a lead would usually drum up the other investors; with no lead, it's the entrepreneur who drums up the others.
no fixed amounts, no closing: with convertible notes (as opposed to straightforward sale of shares, aka priced round) the entrepreneur can be a lot more flexible. The round doesn't technically have a valuation, but it does have a valuation cap: see my write-up http://www.yes-no-cancel.co.uk/2010/05/05/valuation-caps-on-... for an explanation. The amount raised can also be flexible.
This doesn't require any more of a leap of faith or any lower valuation than a priced round, and the paperwork is simpler. That's why convertible notes are very popular for seed rounds these days.
I was confused about some of the jargon in Paul Graham's "The future is no fixed amount, no fixed closing date, and no lead" quote so I looked them up best I could: no lead - A lead investor is basically someone who commits, and says "we're in" at the start of the round. They commit organizational and negotiating resources. They also typically take a board seat. See http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2007/10/the-lead-invest.htm…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For entrepreneur 'networking' linkedin types I can see the value. For everyone else, not sure...
Actually I can see the value for any random middle-manager at a big company whose job involves a bucketload of email correspondance with lots of people outside of the company. That seems like a big enough market to me.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
We believe the context we provide is a much more valuable use of the limited sidebar space than the ads it replaces; and we think that adds value to the platform, both for Google and for its users. People evidently agree, as (nearly) nobody complains about the loss of the ads, but lots of people love the utility we provide - and indeed have switched to Gmail to get it. We're not interested in cheating Google out of t…
That didn't really answer the questions.