Day: 9 April 2012

Cha-Ching ⇥

The reason I’m posting a bunch of links regarding the big Instagram deal is because I don’t think anyone saw this coming. It’s pretty shocking.

Anyway, Mike Isaac over at Wired magazine notes what each of the employees will be receiving. Suffice to say, it’s a huge paycheque, especially for the CEO:

[Instagram CEO Kevin] Systrom owns 40 percent of Instagram, according to a source close to the company, who provided Wired with figures from 2011. That will net Systrom $400 million to take home as a result of the deal.

Isaac also notes that Instagram’s 13 part-time employees each get a portion of a $100-million pool. That’s one enormous payday.

Instagram’s User Base Wasn’t the Only Thing Growing ⇥

Shawn Blanc:

Last week: April 6, 2012, Instagram raised another $50 million on the same valuation of $500 million.

Today: Sold for $1 billion.

That’s one hell of an increase. My bet is that Facebook wanted to ensure they captured their biggest competition in the mobile photo sharing space.

On a slightly related note, Shawn Blanc recently rolled out a dashing update to his site. You should check it out.

Facebook to Buy Instagram for $1 Billion ⇥

Thomas Houston:

Mark Zuckerberg took to Facebook today to announce that Facebook has agreed to acquire photo-sharing service Instagram for $1 billion in “a combination of cash and shares of Facebook.” The entire Instagram team — 6 employees — will be joining Facebook, and interestingly, Zuckerberg says that Instagram will be built and grown “independently” and that its integration with other services is an “important part of the experience.”

Big, slightly alarming news. I love Instagram, and I don’t hate Facebook nearly to the extent that detractors seem to. But I can’t see how the sterility of the latter will integrate with Instagram.

Neven Mrgan explained on Twitter:

Instagram is the first Facebook acquisition of a popular product. Really interested to see how they’ll integrate it into FB.

There was Gowalla, which was a) already riding off into the sunset, b) stitched into Facebook invisibly; the product disappeared.

Absolutely. I’m not sure Facebook understands how important it is to preserve the Instagram experience.

My other theory is that Facebook desperately wants to acquire Tim Van Damme.