I know very little about David Karp. But after reading this, I'm a bit surprised that he decided to sell Tumblr.<p>The way Marco talks about David's disinterest in money, and his singular obsession with Tumblr, made me think he wouldn't even consider selling it to someone else.<p>I'd be curious to hear his reasons for selling, as oppose to doing a strategic investment like Facebook did with Microsoft at one point.
The post says he won't make "yacht-and-helicopter money"... I think helicopters are cheaper than he thinks. On a billion-dollar acquisition, I can't imagine the near-cofounder having less than 1% (hopefully quite a bit more). This means at least $10M, which should be plenty for a helicopter. Maybe I'm reading his comment too literally.
<i>David pushed me to do amazing work that I didn’t think was possible.</i><p>A quality of a great leader.<p>Phenomenal post, thanks so much for sharing this.
Congratulations Marco, to you and your team. Your writeup is great to read-- the history and growth of Tumblr firsthand. I'm excited to see what you all build.
I like reading this guys blog, it's well written and weaves a nice story to follow almost always.<p>It's a shame a lot of the Tumblr crowd are like this:<p><a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/tumblrinaction" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/tumblrinaction</a><p>The technology seems great and simple to use.
>>>Even though Tumblr was never a one-person company, it usually felt like a one-person product.<p>That.<p>I didn't stay with Tumblr long -- the limitations eventually got to me -- but I always had the sense this was a product with a personality behind it, not a committee.
I'm pretty sure Karp announced their funding at the Nov. 2007 New York Tech Meetup, if I recall correctly.<p>That was a darn awesome Tech Meetup (presented my 1st thing there & Marco graciously took pictures of the event, some of me presenting too; thanks Marco) as there were only two unknown start-ups presenting that night amongst giants.<p>Congrats to them!
"David would come in with a grand new feature idea, and I’d tell him which parts were infeasible or impossible, which tricky conditions and edge cases we’d need to consider, and which other little niceties and implementation details we should add."<p>David was the lead developer or?
"Acquisitions on this scale usually work well." I don't know what planet Marco's on -- despite his citation of Youtube, acquisitions hardly ever work well, let alone on this scale.<p>But he does have a habit of writing things with a straight face that other people never would.
An inspiring story written in a humble perspective. A story of keeping focus in the face of funding problems that are all too common in early startups.<p>It reminds me of the Facebook story where some of the early founders wanted to introduce advertising very early on.
Lovely article. Glad to have read it. Suspect Marco is a little modest about his contribution, but great to hear he came out ahead, and then some.<p>Truly hope Tumblr can maintain its independence from the Yahoo hive mind/wholesome image, just like Conde Nast has let Reddit's less-than-family-friendly stuff thrive (smartest decision ever).<p>Despite all that, the $1B valuation is batshit, not unlike the housing market in NYC these days ($1.6MM for his Brooklyn one bedroom?) I'm glad to be escaping the clutched of NYC in several weeks from now. A yard!
I still have my doubts, on more than one front, but that was definitely an interesting and worthwhile read. I haven't been part of the Tumblr community -- rather just seeing individual items when they are cited elsewhere -- so this provides a bit of perspective especially as to its genesis.
Is it just me or it looks like another Instagram/Facebook deal? For sure, they got great payouts, although it seems more like a lottery to me - how many of those swinging for the fences actually manage to do that?<p>And was tumblr ever profitable?