
You can not buy ideas or talent - sant0sk1
http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2566-you-can-not-buy-ideas-or-talent
======
JoelSutherland
The title is false.

Here is why their style works:

We read the exaggeration and translate it from 37Signals to the reasonable
thing we expect they are trying to say. For example, he might be saying:

* "Buying ideas/talent rarely works out"

* "Buying ideas/talent only works if you pay with culture"

* "Buying ideas/talent can't work if the buyer is big"

So when we encounter a 37Signals post and generally disagree with it, there is
easy fuel for our side of the argument. Those that agree with the general idea
get to argue for their favorite interpretation of what they must be saying.

The imprecision and tone creates two sides maximally equipped to have a stupid
internet discussion.

~~~
danilocampos
Thank you. Couldn't have said it better.

37signals is becoming one of the most accomplished trolls on the internet. The
first (non patent) corporate troll? Surely they can't be, but I can't think of
another.

The sad thing is, they have interesting things to talk about. But today, just
like yesterday, they go for the cheap thrills of a spicy headline over having
a substantive discussion about things that are important.

In the short term, this generates pageviews and, potentially, sales. In the
long term, it just makes them look like schmucks. Through the tone of their
blog, I've gone from having a decent opinion of 37signals to being entirely
unwilling to ever work with or for them. They just seem more like zealots than
they do fun guys.

Is alienating tech professionals really the best strategy for their business?

~~~
pchristensen
Have you ever met them in person? I've met Jason and David and they're both
smart and understand nuance much more than their style of writing conveys.
I've developed a mental filter with for their titles that turns absolutes into
mostlys, so "You can't buy ideas or talent" turns into "Buying ideas or talent
is rarely successful". "Acquisition Condolences" becomes "Sometimes a big
payday includes a soul-crushing earnout where you lose your work environment
and your product dies".

Joel Spolsky wrote once about how if you're going to make an airtight
argument, it takes so long to list all the caveats that all the power is out
of it.

~~~
scott_s
Having to apply a mental filter like that is tiresome. I'd rather just skip
it.

~~~
joshuacc
Personally, I find that it's the same mental filter I apply to just about any
discussion outside of academic subjects. Very few of the people I know bother
to use qualifiers like "usually," "often," etc. Those are just understood.

~~~
mbreese
I'm an academic, and I rarely use absolutes such as 'always' or 'never' (this
sentence being a good case). It's just so ingrained in academia that there are
very few absolutes, and that there are almost always edge cases. As such, I
refrain from making those statements...

But that doesn't make it any less tiring... my mental output filter requires a
decent amount of effort to keep going and makes things more verbose...

~~~
derefr
In fact, since there _are_ so few absolutes, both in and out of academia, it
should be taken as a given that any time someone uses one, they are using it
as a figure of speech; to actually come to their true, basically-now-jargon
meanings of universal quantification, the speaker must add further words. It's
basic Huffman encoding: the figurative use occurs much more frequently, so it
gets the short means of expression.

------
pclark
Dreaming. If you can snap up a team of smart developers for $1M cash each +
$200k/year salary for 4 years, that can have a large impact on your product
road map.

Say you're, for example, Apple looking to push out iOS 4.1 for iPad, and you
acquired a Mac dev studio of 30 talented people for $60M - that can have a
large impact (eg: bring forward your road map by 6 months) for the next few
years.

Another example might be Facebook acquiring FriendFeed, Brett went on to be
CTO - are you seriously saying that isn't a talented and valuable acquisition
for that talent? $50M is a drop in the ocean for companies turning over
billions.

Also saying ideas/talent can't be acquired when they took a "minority private
equity investment" from Jeff Bezos for:

> ... the wisdom of a very special entrepreneur who’s been through what we’re
> going through. Someone who sees things a little differently and makes us
> feel right at home

If you're looking to create, say, a payment platform (Facebook Credits) maybe
it makes sense to get the talent that has created a similar product (eg:
TipJoy)

Also Apple acquiring NeXT and Steve Jobs becoming CEO and transforming the
company - sure there was tech, _but you know ..._

~~~
joshuacc
While I agree that the post overstates DHH's point, the Bezos investment isn't
relevant. The first line is "When it comes to acquisitions..." He's talking
about businesses being acquired, not a minority investment.

------
swilliams
Yes you can, but you have to do it right. Apple bought SoundJam and turned it
into iTunes. Google bought YouTube, and that seems to be working alright thus
far. Amazon bought Zappos, and they haven't been relegated to the dust bin.

"As soon as [the talent has] to deal with three layers of reporting, quarterly
budget cycles, and swing-door managers, they turn off the creativity and head
for the exit."

True, but here is a novel idea: don't make your prized acquisition deal with
that crap. Yeah it'll require significant work to get it to be a good
relationship, but if both parties can pull it off, it can be hugely beneficial
for everyone.

Look, I know 37s really likes to paint acquisitions as black and white, but
they just aren't.

~~~
kgo
I don't know about SoundJam, but I'd argue that Google and Amazon bought the
brand names YouTube and Zappos. Google wanted the 'eyeballs' attached to
YouTube to sell more advertising. Amazon certainly has a big enough retail
infrastructure that they could have just started selling clothes on the main
site.

~~~
kgo
Where 'brand' translates to 'customers' in the context of the article.

------
nkohari
Yet another black and white, egotistical, all-knowing piece of shit post on
SVN. I used to be inspired by this blog, but now it's just so much drivel.

~~~
pchristensen
If you've been a long time reader, then you've probably grown and matured to
where you understand and appreciate nuance, rather than just needing the jolt
of heavy-handed inspiration that their opinionated pieces provide.

I'd bet that their titles and articles from 2 or 4 years ago were just as
aggressive and link-baity.

~~~
zavulon
Not really. Back then, they weren't looking for cheap controversy, their posts
actually contained good content and were reasonably named. Just from a random
look ...

[http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/3_ways_to_make_money_with...](http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/3_ways_to_make_money_with_your_software.php)

[http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/confidence_in_people_proc...](http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/confidence_in_people_process_and_purpose.php)

<http://37signals.com/svn/posts/1324-beware-of-future-creep>

I agree with 'nkohari', SVN blog has turned into a self-promotional, douchey
piece of shit, existing solely to generate traffic/signups for their webapps,
and providing very little actual value.

------
frederickcook
Here is a great example to the contrary:

"How do you retain startup employees long after an acquisition? Rackspace
acquired Webmail.us in 2007, and today an astounding nine out of the ten
original employees including the founders are still at the company and going
strong. Can you believe that?" \- Bill Boebel, Rackspace VP-Strategy

[http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/6405?return=/ideas/in...](http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/6405?return=/ideas/index/7/category:/presenter:boebel/category):

~~~
run4yourlives
_Can you believe that?_

The Fact that it is presented as being hard to believe should tell you a lot.

------
dugmartin
Aquisitions are not about buying ideas or talent. They are about buying
decisions. Decisions are some of the most expensive thing a large company can
make in terms of time. A large company aquiring a startup is purchasing a set
of decisions, both internally and in their customer's mind, that has moved
that startup to the point they are at aquisition. If the acquisition is made
when the startup is moving into a repeatable business model then the aquiring
company can transition the startup into a mature business using the
operational and finance expertice that a large company brings. If the startup
has not yet found a model then the startup's normal pace of decision making
will hit the corporate wall and it will fail.

(I added this comment to the svn comments too)

------
run4yourlives
I see a lot of comments critical of the generalization, which I suppose is
fair, but misses the point.

Generalizations and stereotypes are usually based on a truth. Simply pointing
out that a generalization is in fact that does not make it untrue, and it most
certainly does not provide enough of a reason to discount the concept in a
meaningful way.

You guys are caught up in the fact that 90 is not 100 and extending that to
assume that 90 is either not true or not important.

It is on both counts. It matters little whether 90 is 70, 80, or 100 in
matters that aren't exact science. If you have some sort of point to make that
90 is in fact 20, then please, make it (I've yet to see one).

Otherwise you add little as a counter to this article.

~~~
nkohari
I don't think anyone is debating the point that it's _possible_ that
acquisitions can end up this way. But even putting aside the hyperbole and
absolutism that's shown in this article, I challenge the claim that
acquisitions go poorly more times than they don't. My guess is that for every
public flameout, there are a hundred acquisitions that end up positive for
everyone -- you just don't hear about them, because saying "everything went
better than expected" isn't interesting as a news item.

~~~
run4yourlives
That's rather easy to challenge but at the same time very difficult.

All I have is anecdotes directly, but from being on both sides of 4
acquisitions total, it has been true 100% of the time. Not a single
founder/c-level leader has remained from the bought company over five years.
Often, significant turmoil was present prior to that final departure.

This has been such an observation to me that I would strongly suggest that if
you were to be on the buyer's side you should terminate all staff from the
acquired company as soon as feasible, thereby making either a customer or
"idea" purchase. This is exactly what DHH is saying.

On the other hand, acquiring a company and letting it live "as-is" I suppose
is a viable alternative; better accomplished by just investing in the company
itself though.

The benefit of acquisition is control, and it is a waste if you aren't going
to exercise that control. I have never seen control exercised by the purchaser
that is always, 100% completely inline with what the decision making of the
acquired.

That means a clash is an inevitable certainty, so DHH's point is accurate.

------
thornad
I think it is a great post, and having been through the process, it is
absolutely accurate for me and speaks volumes. The fact that there are
exceptions to the rule only reinforces the rule. Nothing is absolute, except
for the predictable reaction of the people who will attack anything they can
come up with a counter example for, usually involving Apple or Google (or some
other one in a billion type exceptions).

------
damoncali
Tell that to Cisco. They practically built the whole dang company on talent
and idea acquisition.

------
joshu
Ruminations on acquisitions by people who have never been on either side of
one?

------
endlessvoid94
I'm sorry, but does anyone else feel like their blog posts are filled with
sweeping generalizations? I also noticed their use of "it turns out", sneaky
little bastards.

They seem to write a LOT of opinionated blog posts recently that I just
disagree with completely.

------
smithbits
Let's make a 2d matrix with 4 cells. The X axis is small company, large
company, and the Y axis is successful product and failed product. Products hop
about these boxes all the time. Large companies sell off divisions or spin off
products, small company products vanish and even large companies have turned
around failed product lines. This piece seems to assert that the transition
from small company / successful product to large company mostly results in
failed products. Are there any numbers to suggest a higher failure rate than
any of the other transitions?

------
jpmc
I will happily sell ideas.

------
paul
Android

------
ww520
It has been working pretty well for Microsoft. A large portion of their
products were bought along with the developers. They were able to develop them
and turned out huge product success.

------
billswift
Since we don't have slavery it is literally true that you can't buy talent;
but renting seems to work perfectly well for most companies.

------
itblarg
And by virtue of 42 comments and counting, 37signals wins again...

------
earl
Hells yeah you can. Deliver integer (integer >1) multiples of my salary and
you can hire my talent tomorrow. And if you're interested, I know a group of
people that built systems that work at enormous scale, probably only shy of
the G and better than Y. Make the same offer and you can probably get any of
us. Especially if the integer is greater than two.

