entombed in the shrine of zeroes and ones

So Om Malik wrote this thing about what impelled Facebook to buy Instagram.  First off, i can't get past Malik's assertion of "Facebook's achilles heel"[sic] being "mobile photo sharing".  Seriously?  Mobile photo sharing is a hard-driving revenue stream for anyone in this world?  Is there any evidence that this was considered a weakness by anyone at Facebook?  I can lean on my experience and tell you that sharing photos from my Android phone is stone easy to Facebook, because my phone came with the Facebook app installed.  I couldn't've done it on Instagram at all until very recently.  Facebook was worried about Instagram's mobile photo sharing mojo?  I call bullshit.

And calling Instagram "a platform built on emotion"... what the hell is that about?  I wonder if he's an advance Facebook stock share owner, because it sure as hell sounds like he's trying to talk himself into the deal, which is no less than ludicrous.  Who drops $1B, even if most of it is fake money, on an emotion-based platform?  Emotion fades.

Some are comparing it to Google buying YouTube, but others are comparing it to eBay buying Skype.  I think that it's far more likely to be closer to the latter, except worse.  Bottom line: even if, somehow, this turns out to be a good deal for Facebook, it won't be because of them addressing their supposed "Achilles heel", or because of the strength of Instagram's "emotion".

Bonus cluebie: some "business leader" thinks that Twitter "F$($#@ UP in somehow letting Instagram ended up inside of Facebook"[sic], because nothing says "mobile business advisor" than someone playing with ginned-up valuation numbers.

Paul Graham has written some interesting and enjoyable essays over the last few years.  Peter da Silva pointed me at his latest, where he starts off by pointing out the ways that Yahoo! failed to grab a commanding lead in the Internet game and takes a tangent into companies where hacker culture is key.  At first i was engaged with what he was saying, probably in no small part because of confirmation bias, but then it became more of a matter of him saying, "Companies with hacker culture are awesome because good hackers write good software," without actually supporting his case; the longer i examine the essay, the more it reads like selection bias and circular reasoning: "Yahoo! had no hacker culture and sucks; Google has hacker culture and rules.  Ergo, hacker culture leads to success."

What also really got me going was a paragraph that Tom Fawcett pointed out.

Probably the most impressive commitment I've heard to having a hacker-centric culture came from Mark Zuckerberg, when he spoke at Startup School in 2007. He said that in the early days Facebook made a point of hiring programmers even for jobs that would not ordinarily consist of programming, like HR and marketing.

This is quite frankly the stupidest thing i've read in quite some time and falls right in line with Zuckerberg's hubris.  That's not a commitment to hacker culture; that's falling prey to your blind spots.  Having hackers work with HR and Marketing is a good idea; having them work in those departments is delusional.

There's no doubt that, when your company's product depends on the work of programmers, the vast majority of which fall culturally under the hacker umbrella, it behooves management to foster that culture in order to maximize their return from their employees.  But to go from that to implying that companies that let the inmates run the asylum reap the most benefits is at best wishful thinking and at worst foolish.

There's a second half to my response to Graham's essay which i'll write once i wake up from my nap.

RMH joined the group U.S. SUPREME COURT JUST SOLD THE USA TO THE FILTHY RICH, IT'S FASCISM .
rone Uh, i'm pretty sure that's not what "fascism" means.
RMH Well, I am a Democrat too and they dont always make sense either. Besides someone invited me and I didnt want to be unappreciative.
rone So you'll go along with what other people say even if you disagree, just so you don't hurt their feelings? You really are a Democrat.
RMH Thank you sir may I have another?!