Raven’s Range
Blather around a virtual range

1. 

   stephanie

   Because it’s not about money, it’s about the project you created and brought to the world. Because there might have been a hefty retention bonus. Because there might have been some other interesting related project at Yahoo. Because you love what you do. Because you enjoy working and define yourself by your occupation. Because you socialize primarily within work social groups.

   There are loads of reasons to keep at it. Money is only one form of motivation. The last three years I worked at Lee’s I was actually making a negative income. But I had to be driven out by someone going psycho rather than walk out the door.

   Jun 18th, 2008

2. 

   Shendoah (5 comments.)

   For some people the money isn’t the issue. They LIKE to work. The creativity and drive doesn’t die just because they made a quick bootle of money.

   Jun 18th, 2008

3. 

   Linda R. Moore

   Yeah…but there are so many different ways to do that other than in a business.

   I still don’t get it. :: shrug ::

   Jun 18th, 2008

4. 

   Linda R. Moore

   They were still doing Flickr, as best as I can tell. Dunno about the retention bonus.

   If someone gave you 15 million bucks, wouldn’t you still do something different, though, like start your own shop without psychos?

   Ah well. It’s not likely anyone would buy Markeroni for that level of money, so I guess I’m safe from ever having to make that choice. ;)

   Jun 18th, 2008

5. 

   Shendoah (5 comments.)

   My uncle spent YEARS developing his company. When it went public, well, Stinking Rich would be one of the concepts that resulted. He’s loaded. And he still runs the company. It’s his baby, his passion, what drives him to get up and go each day. Not the money, though that certainly is a nice pay off for all the years of work and sacrifice. Not everyone has that drive, that dream, that ambition. And not everyone sees the fruits of those drives, dreams and ambitions come to pay off.

   There’s a reason we don’t get it. And won’t have it.

   Jun 18th, 2008

6. 

   Linda R. Moore

   It’s just not the same. He kept his own business and did not sell it to anyone. That I can relate to. These guys sold their company.

   If I sold my company, it would be because a) I was burnt out on it and couldn’t take it any further and b) wanted the money.

   Maybe the others thought that Yahoo could take Flickr to heights they couldn’t themselves. I guess I could understand that. But for my part, after running (for example) Markeroni my way and then relinquishing it to be run a different, more corporate way, I would just leave them to it and go do something different.

   Jun 18th, 2008

7. 

   Thorfinn (2 comments.)

   Err - founders and other high-profile executives of a company being bought out like that are almost certainly going to be contractually bound by the terms of the buyout to:

   1. Stay on board and at least appear to be positively involved
   2. Not sell off their shares within some fairly lengthy timeframe.

   The reasons are obvious when you consider the share-price effects of the founders doing the opposite the moment the buyout happens.

   Jun 18th, 2008

8. 

   Linda R. Moore

   I think contractual obligations would rather depend on who made the overtures–”Buy me” is a different flavor of deal than “Can we buy you?” Forcing someone to stay involved for two years after the sale strikes me as possible, but unlikely.

   I’m not talking about shares–I’m talking about a cash sale for $30 million. I don’t know whether this was a buy-out, or a “Hey, we’re for sale, what will you give us?” kind of deal to the highest bidder, either.

   :: shrug :: But certainly, this would be one reason to stay, which is indeed what I asked for.

   In other news, I had no idea you were still reading my LJ. Hope life is treating you well. :)

   Jun 18th, 2008

9. 

   Thorfinn (2 comments.)

   Well, I’m assuming Flickr is owned by some kind of corporation, with shares, and that Yahoo paid the founders (presumably in cash, but there was most likely some kind of share-swap portion of the deal as well) for their shares in Flickr’s controlling corporation. The founders may or may not have kept some of Flickr’s shares in the process.

   However, whether they did keep any Flickr shareholding or not, I know that “you must hang around and look good and involved for two years” (or equivalent wording) is something that certainly does regularly wind up in contracts of sales of that size and nature, including very serious financial penalty clauses for failing to do so.

   And if they did keep some (not enough to be controlling interest, obviously) shares in Flickr, there would certainly be very serious contractual limitations on when and to whom they could sell those shares, possibly much longer range limitations than two years.

   Even small companies being bought and sold tend to have equivalent terms - if not quite as severe as the multiple year restrictions that a multi-million dollar deal would carry.

   As for the reading thing, a few months ago, I kicked in an authenticated RSS feed to my LJ in my AppleMail - much easier to slurp and read quickly that way. :-)

   Jun 18th, 2008

10. 

    Linda R. Moore

    It’s a whole different world, this corporate business stuff.

    Re: the LJ feed, kinda funny, as I don’t post much on LJ; I just cross-post the feeds from my four blogs there. So this is really a convoluted way to read these blogs. ;)

    Jun 28th, 2008

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