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Comment by tamersalama | Hacker News Reader

Why are these the only 2 outcomes? Why not grow a business?

Partly because of the changing pace of technology. A watch company could be pretty sure 100 years ago that watches would still be around in 20 years, sure the technology might need to be updated but not dramatically. You think anyone will even use Heroku in 5 years? There is a new language and technology every month now that gets hype, it's unlikely something like this will continue to grow for the long term.

I'm sorry but that's a bullshit notion. Why is anyone still using PHP today? or Java? Just cause something new comes out, it doesn't automatically displace the old. I think paperback's are more likely to go away before the last rails app is written.

Agreed. Also, why does a company have to be tied to one bit of technology?

We hear a lot that being a good programmer/designer/etc. isn't language-specific but that it is a skill-set that transcends technical knowledge. Why isn't this the same for companies and products?

Even if they grow, eventually they'll be too big to remain the "friendly cool kid next door."

With 20,000 employees, it's just not the same.

Either way, you can't expect a founder to stick around for 30 years with the same company and product. It takes a Steve Jobs to keep things interesting over decades.

I think you just nailed why so many modern companies suck.

100 years ago you put your name on the company and treated it's performance as your personal reputation (for better or for worse). Today the most common "strategy" is to build something just good enough that you can attract enough customers to generate a revenue stream that is interesting to someone else, and then wash your hands of it.

This punishes everyone who was willing to suffer with you while you worked out the kinks.

I'm sorry but the whole thing just seems too "deadbeat dad" to me.

I guess it depends what kind of investors they've taken on, and how eager they are for a big money exit.

I think we all accept that another outcome can happen.

But the likelihood of independent growth for a platform of any type is incredibly low. For each Google how many Herokus and Friendfeeds are there?

The driving force behind very few independent companies is a lack of an IPO market. Without a payoff for VCs you have to grow organically through customer funding or sell to a big acquirer, or in rare cases pay off investors with debt.

They offer founders too much money to pass up.

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