
Jack Dorsey Joins Disney’s Board Of Directors - dko
http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/23/jack-dorsey-joins-disney/
======
amckenna
It's worth checking out the NYT piece on the rise of Twitter and the role
Dorsey played. His rise to fame was a tumultuous one and while he is no doubt
a talented individual he is credited with more than he actually created. It
will be interesting to see how his influence develops and shapes Disney's
future.

 _" Ideas rarely, if ever, come from the mind of a single person, but those
who go down in lore as visionaries take credit for them as if they do. Dorsey
seemed to understand this intrinsically, too.”_

 _" By this point, many Twitter investors believed what Dorsey had been
telling the media for the past two years. More important, they knew the public
did. He could be an effective public face of Twitter as Costolo managed the
operations. The board was grateful for the $25 million that Costolo arranged
in deals with Microsoft and Google, and he had a good rapport with Twitter
employees. A pact between all of the investors was formed. By late September,
Costolo was told that he had been picked to be interim C.E.O. Williams was
out. Dorsey was back in."_

[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/magazine/all-is-fair-in-
lo...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/magazine/all-is-fair-in-love-and-
twitter.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all)

~~~
pjbrunet
Noah Glass deserves all the credit, IMO.

[http://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-cofounder-noah-
glass-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-cofounder-noah-glass-2011-4)

"Originally, (Twitter) was all running on my laptop on my desk. An IBM
Thinkpad. Using a Verizon wireless card. It was right there on my desk. I
could just pick it up and take it anywhere in the world. That was a really fun
time."

~~~
belluchan
Calling him a founder seems to be a stretch based on Twitter's official
comments on the matter. He wrote the code. He was an engineer employed by
Odeo. That doesn't mean he's a "founder." I don't know which side is true, but
my sense is that calling him a "founder" is tech linkbait.

~~~
wyclif
He didn't call Glass a founder. He implied Glass wrote all the early code and
essentially built Twitter, and said he deserves all the credit for that early
building out. I really don't have a problem with putting it that way. That's
true based on everything I understand about the Twitter backstory (and
confirmed by Noah, Ev, Biz, Jason, and Jack himself).

~~~
pjbrunet
I think he's referring to the article's headline. But that quote resonates
with me. I would never serve files from a laptop--who does that?! But it does
have battery backup in the event of power failure, LOL! I can see the appeal
for getting something working quickly. And you don't have to worry as much
about random web host stealing the source. At least in my imagination, Noah's
coding style was perfect for getting a prototype working, but had to pass it
on to "do it by the book" engineers who no doubt cursed "this spaghetti is all
wrong, there's globals everywhere!"

~~~
peterjancelis
"random web host stealing the source" really shouldn't be a concern at MVP
stage.

~~~
pjbrunet
In the old shared hosting days, they knew exactly which scripts were suddenly
eating up resources. You might get an email like, "Hey we disabled xyz.php
because it was hogging the server." So it's not like they couldn't see who was
about to make boatloads of money and then jump on the bandwagon.

------
sown
Kudos to him.

I'm not bitter or upset but I'm thinking: Why can't _I_ think of stuff people
want? Maybe I don't know how to listen? He's a human, just like me, but I
can't do anything. Maybe asking this question is a first signal of failure, or
at least that I'm of a wrong mindset, that separates a good entrepreneur, whom
wouldn't ask that question and just go do it, from people like me.

If his WP page is accurate, it's not like he didn't have startups that didn't
work out but he still made it.

~~~
bobbles
Well if you think back to the release of twitter the overwhelming response on
most tech sites was that it was stupid/useless/waste of time, etc...

("Why would I want SMS restrictions on the web?!")

Maybe you need to get out of the tech-site bubble :)

~~~
Edmond
Count me amongst those who shared that impression...my impression hasn't
changed much! It obviously isn't completely stupid or completely useless but
its utility is still shockingly low especially when you consider its stock
market success.

I am on twitter mainly as a way to promote my company and connect with
prospective people, but otherwise the utility of twitter still strikes me as
rather low.

It is a good medium for one-to-many (aka broadcast) communication but there
aren't enough interesting people in the world to make that a viable option.
Not to mention once you start to follow more than 20 people your stream
becomes a fire-hose that is not really consumable.

I guess now that it is a public company we'll have to wait and see if it can
turn the amount of profit that matches its valuation.

Also stupid/useless and success are not necessarily mutually exclusive, we are
talking about humans after all :)

~~~
chipsy
> once you start to follow more than 20 people your stream becomes a fire-hose
> that is not really consumable.

I only feel like people discover the "true" nature of Twitter after they go
above 200 follows - it is intended to be saturated consumption like TV,
something that can be consumed habitually at any idle moment. There is a
Matrix-like quandary in this, in that users who want to filter stop themselves
from reaching the point where they see a net-positive outcome. IRC is very
similar in that getting the full effect out of it means keeping dozens of
channels open.

------
mkrecny
And the mimicry of Steve Jobs continues.

~~~
onedev
I feel like people who say this do it to downplay his accomplishments. It's a
very negative tone.

~~~
mkrecny
Yes, it's a negative tone. My feeling is that he unjustifiably self-identifies
with Jobs. As mentioned, I've recently read 'Hatching Twitter' and it paints
him in an unseemly light.

I don't see how the comment is downplaying his accomplishments though.

~~~
onedev
Interesting. I haven't really read that book but it seems that most really
successful people have had to behave in very cutthroat ways no? Of course I
may be saying this with subject to some selection bias. We have our standard
set of Bill Gates, Zuck, Steve Jobs, Jack Dorsey, etc to provide some weight
to the statement but I'm sure there are many many noble leaders that I haven't
heard of that weren't as ruthless but maybe that's why they haven't achieved
the same level of success? I'm not sure.

I'd love to read the book but I'd love it even more if you could give an
overview of the sentiments echoed in "Hatching Twitter".

In any case, I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you that Jack is an
unlikable person, but was simply pointing out that almost every time someone
has said "Oh he thinks he's Steve Jobs", it's often to downplay the story at
hand. It's cool that Jack is on the board of Disney, that a significant
accomplishment.

~~~
mkrecny
> I'd love to read the book but I'd love it even more if you could give an
> overview of the sentiments echoed in "Hatching Twitter".

The book credits him with seeding the concept for Twitter, but certainly not
for fleshing it out. At a very early stage, Jack was ousted as CEO and left
with no role at Twitter other than a board seat with no actual voting rights.
While the rest of the team made the product what it is today, and scaled the
business to .5bn users, Jack was on the outside doing nothing. Despite this he
pandered extensively to the media lying about his non-existent role at the
company and daubing himself the 'inventor' of Twitter.

All that said, I've enjoyed watching some of Jack's talks, and I think Square
is incredible (more so than Twitter).

------
alphadog
That's a pretty cushy salary - isn't? Anyone know how much a new Disney board
member gets paid?

~~~
bluthru
Is there a cushier job than being a board member?

~~~
nostrademons
Being on the board of a publicly-traded company also opens yourself up to a
lot of personal liability, as you're legally bound to act in the best interest
of shareholders. I personally would not want the job; if I were wealthy &
accomplished enough to be offered a board membership, I'd much rather have a
quiet life out of the public eye than wrestle with concerns of a multi-
billion-dollar enterprise that needs to satisfy many different constituencies.
Being on the board of a non-profit, however, can be pretty cool. You usually
don't get a salary for that though.

~~~
001sky
They have insurance for this tho, I thought. Its paid for by the company. That
being said, once upon a time this was a much better job than it is today, but
for other reasons.

------
lowglow
I personally find a lot of inspiration visiting the Disney Family Museum here
in SF ([http://www.waltdisney.org/](http://www.waltdisney.org/)). Whenever I
feel like I need a bit of a kick to see how a man can go against all odds to
realize his dreams, I visit the museum. It may be dull to some, but the quotes
alone make it worthwhile.

I find I might owe to Disney and his product some of the push I have. It may
pay off for some of you to take a visit.

------
david_otoole
Please insist on a better script for the next Tron movie.

