Entrepreneurship | Chief Business Futurist Blog

Congrats to all the people I know at Chicago based Feedburner on the now official Google acquisition, but in all reality this deal didn’t have to happen! Let’s see why…

1. Google had already acquired the color orange when they bought Blogger!

2. Feedburner’s symbol is fire, which some folks relate to hell. If you believe this, Google will actually be acquiring evil.

3. Eric Olson of Feedburner (along with Frank Gruber and others) organizes Techcocktail, a tech community quarterly networking party in Chicago. Google could come to Chicago and throw a party all by themselves!

4. Google already had all of Feedburner’s IP because Rick Klau, VP of Publisher Services uses Gmail and Google Docs & Spreadsheets for all business deals! (Second source: talk at ABA TECHshow2007)

5. Google already has had adsense for feeds for a long, long time.

6. Once Google has access to the keys of legitimate RSS sources it will be able to determine the original source blog if it is using a Feedburner feed. When combined with Google Blog Search, Google could likely better control splogs in it’s blog search index which will reduce (MFA) made for Adsense site revenue!

Hey what is done is done though, I hope that funding for many more Chicago startups is now available!

Apparently Google has considerable trouble in regards to the letter D.

First the Dmarc founders left Google.

Now http://www.dodgeball.com/ (dead link 11/2010) founders, Dens Crowley and Alex Rainert (please drop me a note if you read this guys), not only have left Google but they posed for a thumbs down photo that they have posted on Flickr, a Yahoo! property. The photo already has over 26,000 views and appears to have a viral element based on the view count growth, the interesting comments on the Flickr photo and a lot of blogosphere reaction. I’m trying to imagine how frustrated someone must be to post of photo of this nature, announce new project associations and state that they are throwing a party “to celebrate our escape”.

Putting my investment management hat on, I’d like for independent analysts to be allowed on the earning call this Thursday. If allowed to do so, I’d like to ask the following question, “Why is Google having such a hard time with HR and staffing issues, whether it is regarding hiring new employees, retaining pre-IPO employees (see podcast) or integrating acquisitions? Has Laszlo Bock’s background proven not to be the right style of leadership and is it time for a change?” The “all big companies are always ineffective” is a major cop out as there are big companies that are admired and in fact some cases adored.

Ideas on what to do with Dodgeball are everywhere you look. The comments on the Flickr photo are fascinating to read. P.S. When searching for these entries on Google Blog Search I found considerable splog/spam (MFA Made for Adsense) sites – Google should work to solve that issue.

http://spudswebnews.blogspot.com/2007/04/did-dodgeball-even-have-chance.html – Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post – Dead link November, 2013

http://www.blogator.com/g/2833510 (dead post 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://www.electrolicious.com/archives/2007/04/did_twitter_kill_it.html (dead post 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://www.yugatech.com/blog/gooooogle/google-bought-and-killed-dodgeball/ Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post – dead link 12 /2013

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://mcmanus.typepad.com/grind/2007/04/two_dodgeball_f.html (dead link 11/2010)

“http://topicstop.blogspot.com/2007/04/google-alert-google_1007.html (dead link 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

“http://ipfreaks.com/dreamscene/?p=2258” (dead post 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

“http://www.tmesolutions.co.uk/web_design_kent/Marketing+News/2007-04-16/Google+dumped+by+Dodgeball+founders/3800849030” (dead link 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://yummy.vermontconnect.com/cool/dodgeball-founders-leave-google-and-that-leaves-dodgeball-probably-dead/ (dead link 11/2010)

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://google.blogoscoped.cn/?p=417 Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post – Dead link November, 2013

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://www.spiceee.com/pensaletes/2007/04/16/dodgeball-founder-quits-google-will-google-kill-the-serviceDodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post – Dead post November, 2013

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://www.teknolife.com/tech-news/disgruntled-dodgeball-founders-leave-google-infoworld/ post removed

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

http://averageiq.org/dodgeball-founders-google.html – Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post – dead link November, 2013

Dodgeball Founder Departure – April, 2007 post

EDIT: November 25th, 2012 – all of the URLs below are no longer active on the web, I’m removing them active link status:

http://youngmanhattanite.com/2007/04/ym-exclusive-dodgeball-founder-leaves.html
http://www.hypersuper.com/article/google-dodgeball-founder-quits-google-will-google-kill-the-service–610415
http://www.wayneporter.com/2007/04/16/dodgeball-knocked-out-by-twitter-google-snacks-on-dclk-is-twitter-next/
http://cellop.com/news/?p=2621
http://www.vecosys.com/2007/04/16/google-google-going-gone/
http://www.kpsforum.com/rss-news/10998-dodgeball-founders-leave-google.html
http://internet.webexpresspro.com/internet-news/disgruntled-dodgeball-founders-leave-google-infoworld
http://www.fixmood.com/dodgeball-founders-crowley-rainert-quit-google-in-frustration/2007/04/16/
http://techfold.com/2007/04/16/exodus-from-dodgeball-googles-growth-working-against-innovation/
http://www.infobong.com/wordpress/2007/04/16/linkdump-for-20070416/
http://pcniche.info/index.php/disgruntled-dodgeball-founders-leave-google/
http://indianinside.info/blog/2007/04/17/dodgeball-founders-quit-google/
http://socialnetworking.knowhow-now.com/blog/2007/04/16/disgruntled-dodgeball-founders-leave-google/
http://www.supermogul.com/2007/04/dodgeball_founders_dodge_veste.php
http://googlified.com/2007dodgeball-founders-leaving-google/
http://www.personalbee.com/227/12457964
http://dodgeball.sport-blog.biz/8626/dodgeball-founders-stop-playing/
http://mobiko.blogs.com/mutant/2007/04/dodgeball_found.html
http://coloradostartups.com/2007/04/16/overheard-at-the-googleplex/
http://ecpm.typepad.com/clickety_clack/2007/04/roundup_tellme_.html
http://www.vidfreeblog.com/2007/04/17/startup-meme-%C2%BB-dodgeball-founders-quit/
http://www.unofficialseoblog.com/2007/04/17/dodgeball-founders-quit-google/

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