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Comment by 2pasc | Hacker News Reader

I am appalled by the lack of respect Andrew Mason gets on Hacker News. Sure Groupon is the not the most impressive piece of technology built in the past five years, but you can credit this guy for creating a billion dollar Company with millions of customers in a pretty short time frame. They have made mistakes along the way, but who doesn't? I also find his blogging style refreshing compared to all the semi-famous startups CEOs pontificating about stuff they have done. Next batch of YC will be lucky to have him around.

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> I am appalled by the lack of respect Andrew Mason gets on Hacker News.

What? Seriously. What the fuck? Am I viewing the same HN? Just about every Andrew Mason related topic is bountiful of upvoted praise.

I'm appalled by your insinuation that respect is deserved and not earned.

JoeKM. Look at many comments about the bad jobs Groupon has created etc... I am not saying that respect is deserved, but that Andrew seems to have earned respect based on actual achievements.

What really impressed me about Groupon was how it created 12k jobs without really stealing jobs from an existing industry (make your crack about putting unprepared businesses under water here)

When I usually think of tech, I think of it cannabalizing existing industries, for example travel agents.

Andrew created a new take on the advertising industry, and brought work to tons of people. We talk a lot about big ideas- I'd like to see more ideas that send their profit into a large volume of employees, rather than making fortunes for founders or increasing investor's wealth. Humanity sure needs it.

You could say he "disrupted" the Yellow Pages and many local newspapers who were the recipients of local advertising dollars. I agree with your statements about job creation though.

> I am appalled by the lack of respect Andrew Mason gets on Hacker News

It's almost like you haven't been paying attention to a single thing about Groupon for the last couple of years.

You could start here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupon#Reception) but somehow I think that wouldn't matter to you.

Sounds fun: In May 2010, Groupon created a challenge to live off Groupons for one year. The contestant Josh Stevens traveled throughout the United States and to the United Kingdom and purchased all food, drinks, travel, entertainment and more from Groupon for 365 days. At the end of the year, he received a prize of $100,000

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