

Who Founded Facebook? A New Claim Emerges - rob
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/01/technology/01facebook.html?ex=1346299200&en=5112bcf0c8a1c0d9&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

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daniel-cussen
...And? Does it matter, really? A lot of people say it isn't really the idea
that matters. It's execution. This guy would probably have done a lousy
startup anyway.

What about Friendster? Didn't Abrams also clue into Social Networking before
Facebook?

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chaostheory
Anyone remember sixdegrees.com when Amazon bought it during the dot boom... I
agree - this is stupid

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mynameishere
_he developed an automated system that generated personalized query letters to
more than 800 literary agents nationwide_

Spamming literary agents? Ouch. Your typical literary agent gets 100s of
manuscripts a day, and accepts maybe 10 a year. (Much, much worse odds than
applying a yc).

Obviously, the facebook idea was old, old, old even when Zuck got to it, so of
course he's no innovator. Just threw the dice and won. (Plus, he's probably a
good operator, despite his assholism).

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joshwa
mail merge? rocket science.

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mattmaroon
I actually founded Facebook. I called it thebookoffaces.com and built it in
1999. Mark Zuckerberg probably saw it when he did some summer school at the
University of Akron and ripped it off from me.

Did anyone else here found Facebook?

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kyro
You're deeply mistaken.

I actually founded Facebook. It was back in '96 when I realized gluing a book
to my face was the best method in keeping me focused on my reading.

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gojomo
Looks like Greenspan is headed down the path I suggested in a previous thread
[1]: fame as Mark Zuckerberg's Gary Kildall [2].

Even reading Greenspan's book account, it's clear that he dawdled while
Zuckerberg executed. Greenspan frittered around with committees ("'Maybe we
should put more emphasis on the Universal Face Book,' I thought aloud during a
board meeting" [3]), kvetched about media unfairness ("'Can we get _The
Crimson_ to give us any decent coverage at all?' I kept asking my board, week
after week" [3]), worried idly delaying essential features ("I had considered
creating detailed user profile pages at houseSYSTEM's inception, but it seemed
like the worst idea possible when students began to fret openly about
privacy"[4]), and engaged in redundant academic make-work ("'I can write [a
version tracking system],' I offered, not wanting to be the only one without
code to write" [5]).

If tempted to label someone a 'fraud' (as Greenspan did Zuckerberg in a
previous HN thread[1]), consider instead that they may be expressing
competencies in a dimension you can't readily perceive. Maybe even the very
things you're criticizing ("Even though he was clearly smart, he seemed like
he had the capacity to go off in a zany direction at any point in time,
totally unconcerned about the consequences of his actions. I couldn't figure
out any other scenario that would have allowed for the creation of the
facemash site." [6]) are, in fact, strengths.

\--

[1] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24742>

[2] Though, Greenspan would still have to contribue a lot to the computer
industry to hold a candle to Kildall --
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Kildall>

[3] <http://www.aarongreenspan.com/read/read.html?page=293>

[4] <http://www.aarongreenspan.com/read/read.html?page=299>

[5] <http://www.aarongreenspan.com/read/read.html?page=300>

[6] <http://www.aarongreenspan.com/read/read.html?page=296>

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kyro
What would happen to a site like Facebook if Mark were to lose the ConnectU
lawsuit, or to Greenspan if he were to take action?

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Tichy
The proper way to find closure would probably be to found another billion
dollar business. How hard can it be?

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steve
So the lesson is... investors decide who the winner will be.

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rms
It was Zuckerberg's brilliant marketing that made Facebook win, in my opinion.

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bct
How was it marketed?

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rms
Harvard had an internal facebook system that had pictures and brief
descriptions of students. Via your dorm network, you could browse the other
freshmen in your dorm.

Zuckerberg went and jacked into each dorm and downloaded all the data. Then,
he put the pictures up on a site called Facemash. When you went to Facemash,
you were given two pictures and asked to rate which one was hotter. This
quickly became very popular and got Zuckerberg in trouble with Harvard.

He used the negative publicity (but remember that there's almost no such thing
as bad publicity) to launch Facebook. From there, it's a case study in viral
marketing, as Zuckerberg launched at the schools that had the most students
that were friends with the Harvard students.

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awt
Posession is 9/10ths of the law.

