On: Dear Mark Zuckerberg

[lja]

I agree with many of the comments in this thread about how an acquisition offer isn't a bad alternative to just getting ran over by the platform.

However, I can see your point. They should not have encouraged you to build it on your own if they were going to build it themselves. This seems like a lose-lose for both parties.

I've heard a lot of talk on how teams within facebook can work without much centralized oversight and this might be one of the drawbacks. Whoever you spoke to months ago might not have known that another team was working on it.

Then when they prep'ed for your meeting they found out someone had been working on it, felt guilty about leading you on months ago and offered a buy out.

It seems like a communication problem more than anything else.

disclosure: if it is not absolutely clear from my post, I'm speculating on events, I have no ability to gauge what really happened at facebook.

[dalton → lja]

You are right, it could be a communications problem. There are a few details I left out of this post that would suggest it probably isn't.

I would never have spent months and capital building this without constant support and encouragement from Facebook.

[ryanmerket → dalton]

You should have used your Marc Andreessen connection to talk to the VP of Product instead of a Level 2 or 3 dev relations employee.

[shiven → dalton]

Thanks for the details and clarifying the stuff going on "behind the scene".

[robryan → lja]

A communications problem though is still a problem for the business. You don't get a free pass just because you are big.