
Insiders say Google was interested in buying Snap for at least $30B last year - SirLJ
http://www.businessinsider.com/google-offered-to-buy-snapchat-for-at-least-30-in-early-2016-insiders-say-2017-8
======
naturalgradient
I am the only one thinking of
[http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html)?

Why place an over one year old alleged offer in the media today?

Because the shares are free-falling, user growth quarter-over-quarter will
likely be abysmal and float will drastically increase in 2 weeks.

The only possible sliver of hope for shareholders right now is a potential
buyout. Remember how many times Twitter rallied on 'chatter' of a Google bid?

[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/08/twitter-s...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/08/twitter-
stock-price-rises-google-buyout-rumours-not-first-time)

[https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/twitter-buyout-rumors-google-
sa...](https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/twitter-buyout-rumors-google-salesforce-
interest/)

Edit: interesting number of down votes, is this such a far fetched conspiracy
theory? If it was such an open secret at Snap, why has this not come out yet?

~~~
drenvuk
Yep. I feel like it's time to manually make a list of egregious submarine
launchers, though it seems that it's journalists who's coverage is over a
limited set of companies such as social media that are prone to doing things
like this.

It feels like there should be a filter that considers who owns a paper, who
the journalist has previously covered in depth, and what kinds of stories
they're printing. Maybe something like a shill or hater score?

I'm not sure how easy this would be. Does anyone know if something like this
exists?

~~~
danso
Pick a reporter from any outlet and manually perform the analysis that you've
suggested and I think you'll see that it is not easily computational. Even
basic taxonomy of "kinds of stories" is not well implemented on a service such
as Google News.

~~~
avn2109
You'll also find that almost all reporters do the things you don't like. It's
a mostly-inevitable consequence of the system of incentives and constraints
that apply to almost all reporters.

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askafriend
I wouldn't take this seriously.

It sounds like they were just internal rumors that spread around and then
eventually got to a journalist.

Unless the internal sources _directly and verifiably_ worked on drafting the
proposal or discussing the concrete deal being purported - it's most likely
inaccurate, overly optimistic hearsay.

Let's use our best judgement here and not humor the journalist for clicks and
outrage.

~~~
gk1
Even if the rumors were true, it's meaningless. Every business the size of
Google has a list of potential acquisition targets. (There was a leak of one
such list from Amazon or Microsoft, I believe.) "Interest" and "intention" are
two separate things, and the latter counts for a lot more.

------
josteink
True or not, Google clearly needed _yet_ another messaging service, which they
in about a year's time would have messed up and deprecated.

How about they just unify what they already have on offer, and get it working
properly (and maybe worldwide this time!) before messing with yet another
service?

 _sigh_

~~~
arkitaip
I think Google's fragmented approach to messaging is hilarious but what's the
harm in approaching messaging from different angles and apps? Why not keep at
it as startups would, but throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks?

~~~
josteink
I think the biggest problem are discovery and execution. Take the basic
problem: How do I know which of my contacts I can contact where?

Google already had a unified account system, which covers a huge portion of
the internet-using world: Google-accounts. It would be perfect for discovery
and tying things together neatly with what they already have to offer.

If a contact your are chatting with in "Hangouts" (formerly Google talk and
before that gchat?) also was using Duo on his phone... Google could show an
icon for Due and offer a video-call to this person. _If_ both systems used the
same ID.

Instead they chose to create entirely new login systems and identities for
their new IM systems. This needless fragmentation means I don't know which of
my contacts are available on which of the many google-provided IM-services.

Some _small_ changes here could really have significantly lowered the pain
involved, and made all these different apps tie together in a way which would
have been useful.

Now we just have a mess, getting worse every year, and I now refuse to use any
of them for it.

~~~
dcole2929
Because this is honestly a really hard problem. There honestly just not really
a good way of combining accounts without lots of manual effort on the part of
the user. Users also largely don't want this. When Google combined Gmail and
Youtube accounts it was just a god awful clusterfuck that required a lot of
manual intervention for each user to get their stuff back in order. It also
was a net negative because people didn't want their email/google+ tied to
their anonymous youtube accounts.

~~~
rifung
Well I think there was no need to have separate accounts to begin with.
YouTube and Gmail had different accounts because YouTube was a separate
company.

I work for Google but opinions are my own.

~~~
GFischer
I think having the option for separate accounts would have been best.

I try not to post anything on Youtube or favourite videos or anything because
it's tied to my "real" Google identity which is very traceable to me.

For the same reason I try not to link my Facebook or Google accounts to games
and stuff I can help it (though I've mostly given up).

I did have a "fake" Facebook account for lots of stuff that wanted access to
my Facebook feed and it's craptacular. Same for Google, but switching accounts
for Youtube is a hassle,

~~~
josteink
> I think having the option for separate accounts would have been best.

That's very contextual IMO.

Having the same handle across various _private_ communication tools provided
by the same company makes sense.

Forcing you to use your real identity when making _public_ comments traceable
across the internet is something completely different.

Forcing Youtubers to use real identities was bad. For these IM services,
creating new accounts was bad.

------
chollida1
Many years ago Microsoft was trying to purchase Yahoo for $45 a share. Every
company has their Yahoo moment, where they consider making an over the top
purchase offer for a company, that in hind site looks like a terrible idea.

I'm not sure how far the talks went, though given that this is just coming out
now, I'm guessing they didn't go very far. Would be interesting to know if the
offer is still actually on the table like the article hints at.

This is the price you pay for giving up all voting rights. If Evan doesn't
want to sell no sale, no matter how good of an offer is on the table. With
voting rights atleast someone can hold the CEO's feet to the fire to make them
consider the idea.

~~~
puranjay
The MS-Yahoo stories misses the fact that MS was trying to buy Yahoo _with_
its Alibaba stake.

The Yahoo that was sold recently did not include the Alibaba stake. This is
where the key value of Yahoo lies.

If you break it down, the Yahoo Alibaba + Yahoo Japan stake + Yahoo's final
selling price equals Microsoft's $45/share offer

~~~
nashashmi
And the Alibaba stage was bigger back then.

It's sad Yahoo chose to throw in the towel and spin itself off as an internet
company rather than use the Alibaba stake to resuscitate.

~~~
stale2002
Ehh, no point in throwing good money after bad.

A business is a business, and if you lose it makes sense to admit it.

~~~
lenley
Jerry Yang made a magnificent bet... one of the best investments ever in
Alibaba. I don't think he's received enough credit even as Yahoo has been
wound down.

------
mikehines
Snapchat is consistently the top 5 free apps in the US. I think it's worth the
30B for Google to break into that.

~~~
coralreef
Its also not profitable, has slowing growth, and is losing market share as
Instagram/FB copies its features.

I do think the product team at Snapchat is stellar though, they are creative
and innovative and in-tune with what young people want.

~~~
muse900
I'll agree with you. I strongly believe instagram is taking over snaptchat.
All of my friends switched to instagram from snaptchat. Some of them will
still post on both instagram and snaptchat but it feels like they keep posting
on snaptchat until their last set of contacts move from snaptchat to instagram
itself.

I do believe that the people working for snaptchat are trying their best, and
they are innovative etc, its just seems that instagram itself has become the
new hip and its seriously competing with snaptchat.

~~~
flinty
It's interesting how Facebook has such a keen eye to spot the next pivot and
move their giant ship inch by inch methodically in the right direction. They
did it with newsfeed for the main site, main site to mobile transition(albeit
with the html5 fiasco thrown in for a year), carving out messenger(and
pivoting it to another screen to show ads) and now pivoting Instagram to
subsume Snapchat.

Kinda how Netflix vs HBO is a question of - how fast can Netflix become HBO
before HBO becomes Netflix. Instagram is definitely trying their best to have
part of its identity be Snapchat. What is Snapchat trying to become rapidly
before Instagram subsumes Snapchat? The walls are closing in fast(like it
happened with Twitter) and if they don't figure out the answer soon they will
suffer the same fate.

~~~
dabei
Facebook's strategy certainly has worked so far, but I doubt it's sustainable.
Every time Instagram copies a Snapchat feature it is a pivot from their
original vision. Unless Snapchat starts copying Instagram, over time the two
will diverge, one is a focused and coherent product, the other becomes a
feature laden beast.

Also internally I can't imagine how the Instagram engineers feel about their
roadmap being "continue to copy and shoehorn Snapchat features into our app".

------
tedunangst
Why be the next Instagram when you can be the next GroupOn?

~~~
TY
I think WHO is buying is just as important as WHAT is being bought.

Who knows what would happen to WhatsApp if Google bought it? Could it become
one of Google's current chat apps that no one uses?

~~~
rgbrenner
When was the last time they bought a popular rapidly growing platform?

The last that I can remember was YouTube, and that turned out very well for
youtube and google.

~~~
pchristensen
That was also 11 years ago, and only 2.5 yrs after Google's IPO.

------
ChrisBland
Glorified article meant to inflate the stock price.

------
bpodgursky
Well, if Google had acquired Snap last year, at least they'd have a decent
Android app, which couldn't possibly hurt their user numbers.

~~~
dingo_bat
I'm not so sure. Google's own apps are horrid on Android compared to iOS.

------
dmix
Could the investors/founders have cashed out as easily (or for more money)
through this type of acquisition vs an IPO?

That's basically the only relevant question here. I doubt Snap would have been
a better consumer _product_ under Google's direction. They have a consistent
habit of killing them off.

------
mandeepj
This high value only because facebook bought whatsapp for almost $19 billion.
Google offered $10b for whatsapp. They gave up for anything beyond it thinking
it is too much only to realize later it was not.

~~~
acchow
Whatsapp is probably much more valuable to Facebook than to anyone else.

Could Google really significantly monetize Whatsapp? It seems Facebook can't -
but at least Facebook can ensure their other revenue streams aren't decimated
by free-and-fast Whatsapp.

~~~
sjg007
Google needs a messenger + profile play. Snapchat can add profiles (if they
don't have one already).

------
adventured
Well, SNAP is currently trading for $15 billion. If they can get $20 to $22.5
billion for the company right now in an acquisition by eg Google, they should
immediately take it.

Twitter is the picture of where they're going, best case scenario (the
difference in risk of course being, Instagram isn't a serious threat to
Twitter's existence). Twitter has four times the sales (annualized run-rate),
more cash, a lower quarterly burn rate (now), with 23% less market cap.

~~~
nice_981
Well i think you have never used snapchat. Everyone in this thread are not all
accounted in the TAM for snapchat. Before concluding that they should sell or
not, i recommend people to use snapchat for six months. Snapchat is a product
which provides delightful experiences to communicate with your friends where
you can express yourself as the way you are, instead of waiting for a trophy
moment.

Well, SNAP DAP > TWTR DAP, TWTR Average time spent per day: 1-2 minutes SNAP
Average time spent per day: 30-35 minutes. So SNAP has 30X potential than dead
twitter with no product innovation.

~~~
kisstheblade
"can express yourself as the way you are, instead of waiting for a trophy
moment"

And then someone takes a screenshot and "blackmails" you with it later (read
this concept of snap-blackmailing somewhere else just today)

------
bedhead
Yeah, and Google also reportedly offered to buy Groupon for $7 billion, a year
before it went public. Not sure what kind of consolation that gives to
shareholders now...

~~~
tehwebguy
Hah agreed. I bet it wouldn't pass DD tho. SEC was not stoked about the way
they booked revenue considering the % that went right out the door to coupon
vendors.

------
fareesh
Does Google _really_ need another messaging app?

------
zitterbewegung
Yea, people said the same thing about Digg. TBH Google is probably interested
in buying anything remotely social. Digg had the reason of not accepting their
corporate "culture". Either that or Google figures out that they just have to
wait and hire the CEO once the company fails (this happened to Digg).

------
notadoc
Do kids still use Snapchat?

~~~
dalfonso
Disclaimer: I have a small amount of Snapchat shares.

Every time I interact with any sub-21 year old person, I ask them 2 questions:

1.What's the most popular social network among your group of friends? I'd
estimate 7-9/10 say Snapchat. If it is Snapchat, I proceed with question 2.

2.Do you read/interact with the "Discover" section of Snapchat? (Because this
is where I think Snapchat has the most potential to actually make money.) I'd
say 5-7/10 say Yes.

In short, yes, kids still use Snapchat.

~~~
LeifCarrotson
> Every time I interact with any sub-21 year old person, I ask them 2
> questions

You sound like a fun person - JK. But among my conservative, Midwestern sub-21
family and acquaintances, the answer _was_ surging to Snapchat around
Christmas. Then they moved lifestyle posts to Instagram, and moved
communication/socializing back to Facebook. Also, they don't often interact
intentionally with the Discover section.

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sidcool
Looking at Snap's condition right now, and how Instagram is routing it, they
made a smart decision not buying it for that ridiculous amount of money.

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tanilama
Good, now, they can buy it with 50% discount. What a steal!

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whipoodle
It's not just farfetched, it also doesn't really add up or make any sense.

~~~
naturalgradient
Care to elaborate?

