Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Facebook - World's Most Expensive Pet Rock?

Microsoft to Pay $240 Million for Stake in Facebook - New York Times

The two companies said on Wednesday that Microsoft would invest $240 million for a 1.6 percent stake in Facebook. The investment values the three-year-old Facebook, which will bring in about $150 million in revenue this year, at $15 billion.

...

Mark Zuckerberg, the 23-year-old Facebook founder who dropped out of Harvard to build the company, owns a 20 percent share which is now valued at $3 billion. Accel Partners, the venture capital firm that invested $12.7 million in May 2005 and owns 11 percent of Facebook, now holds stock worth $1.65 billion.


Yipes! That is a lot of money.

By the way, didn't Steve Ballmer (CEO of Microsoft) call Facebook a "fad" two weeks ago? Yes, he did. Well, that's one expensive pet rock you got there, Steve-o.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Great Advice from Marc Andreesen

I was catching up on my blogs over lunch this afternoon and came across Marc Andreesen's three-part series on Career Planning. Wow! It is a must read for young folks starting college, just graduating or early in their careers. I've only been out of school for a few years, but his advice is spot on as far as I'm concerned.

In fact, I'm lucky to have gotten some of that same advice either directly from or by watching my mentor, friend and boss.

Here are the three posts:
The Pmarca Guide to Career Planning, part 1: Opportunity
The Pmarca Guide to Career Planning, part 2: Skills and education
The Pmarca Guide to Career Planning, part 3: Where to go and why

p.s. If I'm six years out of school, can I still reasonably say that it's only been "a few years"?
p.p.s. If you're reading this and don't know who Marc is, start here.