Buell is Dead

I think the bit where he said "we proved that a small team of determined passionate engineers could take on industry titans" probably resonated with most startups.

Startups aren't limited to the web. Buell was a startup at one stage, then they got acquired, now they're dead.

I'm with you on this one. It doesn't even seem to have even passing interest to the general HN audience as I understand it.

Well, I think it's more related to HN from an engineering/innovation standpoint than the Tiger Woods earns $1B article that circulated here last week. I was downvoted and told to see the "rules" to a site I've been visiting for ~2 years.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=862601

I think it's just a matter of growth and therefore dilution.

> How is this Hacker News?

He is a hacker who accomplished what most of us would love to accomplish. Yes, it's a different field, but it's still a story of entrepreneurship and hacking at its finest.

This sort of thing happens across industries and is a warning to entrepreneurs of all stripes.

How many tech startups have been purchased by a Yahoo, MS or Google just to see all their work scrapped at some point?

I like to believe that many people build a business not for the exit but because they believe in building something. That's the whole hacker ethos.

It's sad to see and a warning.

I think it's because Buell's motives and ideas are similar to the hacker culture. Instead of just being another name creating bikes, they 'hacked' the classic motorcycle and came up with radical new ideas to push themselves forward, like fuel in the frame. This makes the company more likely to be known and/or appreciated by the hacker community than, say, Kawasaki or Honda.

That's just my two cents tho.

even though it certainly looks like he has taken a hard hit.