Dennis Crowley On Disqus

Avoid The Haters

I noted both Fred Wilson and Dennis Crowley had replied to one of my comments at Fred's blog. How often does that happen!

So I proceeded to follow the guy on Disqus. Then I noticed he had left a few comments on some article about Naveen, his Cofounder.

When you become famous like Dennis has, media is just something you deal with. Dog bit man is not news, man bit dog is news. There is always that background radiation of sensationalism.

I remember being very surprised when Naveen relinquished his day to day role at FourSquare, but I quickly stood on neutral ground, primarily because Naveen himself had a blog post on the topic, and all I knew was what I had read in the media.

Naveen Leaving FourSquare
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I was hoping Naveen would start a new company. It would be good for the NY tech ecosystem.

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Avoid The Haters

And to think the guy made money doing this! :-) There's paid advertising, there is free advertising, and then there is this thing that Dennis Crowley @dens does.



There is wisdom to that term: "Avoid the haters!"

Via Fred Wilson

More To The Naveen Story

Naveen Leaving FourSquare

You don't want to believe everything you read in the media, but obviously there is more to the Naveen story than first emerged. My only sources of information are what are publicly available.

Business Insider: Co-Founder Naveen Selvadurai 'Tried To Fight' His Departure From Foursquare

A source who spoke with Selvadurai during his final discussions with Foursquare says Selvadurai feels pushed out – pushed out by his cofounder Dennis Crowley and the Foursquare board of directors....... Selvadurai told the source he was financially "screwed" when he was forced out too. ........ It's unclear how Selvadurai was financially damaged. When an employee leaves a startup, their salary stops and stock options stop vesting....... The severance was complicated enough that Selvadurai had to bring in a lawyer to help...... "[Selvadurai] tried to fight it," says this source. "It was a contentious thing. He was pretty f---ing upset." A second source familiar with the situation tells us Selvadurai's departure wasn't a simple firing or a resignation: "These things can be very gray." ...... one source tells us Selvadurai and Crowley "hadn't been getting along" for some time now. ...... Another source close to Selvadurai tells us he has, for a while now, felt lost at Foursquare and he has been frustrated about his role....... "Foursquare has a CEO; that job is taken" says a source briefed on Foursquare's founder divorce. "Might Naveen be happy about that or not, I don't know. I can see that as being hard." ...... Selvadurai worked hard to make Foursquare what it is today. But Foursquare has always been Crowley's dream. Crowley has been working on this company in some form for years, even before iPhones or his first startup Dodgeball existed. ...... Selvadurai, Foursquare PR, and Crowley declined to comment....... Jack Dorsey, who some have called the next Steve Jobs, was pushed out of Twitter. The board didn't feel he was ready to be CEO....... The exception may be Google's Sergey Brin, who heads "special projects" while his cofounder, Larry Page, runs the company as CEO. ....... When cofounders do stick around, it's often in non-operating, lower-profile roles. Yahoo's David Filo still works in a cubicle, even though he's a billionaire. Apple's Steve Wozniak never wanted a say in running that company. ...... A source close to Selvadurai can't imagine him being happy with a role like Filo's....... "Naveen is a proud guy and a real entrepreneur -- someone who probably wouldn't want to remain in a situation that wasn't fulfilling for him," says a source.

AllThingsD: Checking In With the Foursquare Founder Parting: More “Tense” (Of Course)

In a terse note, Sevaldurai wrote that he would remain on the company’s board and as an adviser, as well as the “single most vocal user” of the popular check-in service. ...... according to numerous sources inside and outside the company — the impetus for Selvadurai’s departure was a lot more complex and fraught than he or the company indicated. ...... Twitter went through the mother of all contentious partings — twice, in fact — in an ongoing battle among its founders. ...... Selvadurai and Crowley, who had together become New York’s highest profile entrepreneurs in recent years ...... they had come to the conclusion over a series of talks over the last several months that there was no place for Selvadurai any longer at the fast-growing start-up. ...... “This company grew very quickly and a lot of senior management has been added,” said one person with knowledge of the situation. “It got to the point where Naveen was not in charge of much.” ....... since Foursquare began adding execs — I have a list below — he had become ever more sidelined, ending up with a small team focused on platform efforts and supporting APIs. ...... “Naveen was no longer heading any meaningful area of functional responsibility, so things got tense” ....... the departure was not ugly or closely related to either a recent stock sale by employees or its most recent funding in June that valued Foursquare at $600 million. ...... “Dennis and he don’t hate each other — things just changed” ....... “When you look at all the external stuff, Naveen’s leaving was really not tied to anything in particular. The business was really starting to mature … and there is eventually a line in the sand between building a product and building a company.” ...... Foursquare now has 111 employees ...... the discussions about roles at the company became more pronounced. ..... Naveen and Dennis agreed that there was not a place for him day to day ...... Crowley’s public goodbye on Twitter was short and, yes, sweet

After 3 yrs, my @foursquare co-founder is moving onto new projects & big ideas. Can't wait to see what's next @naveen! naveenium.com/stream/next

— Dennis Crowley (@dens) March 5, 2012

Naveen Leaving FourSquare

Image via CrunchBaseI just read the headlines. I have not read the full length articles yet. But I must say I am very, very surprised. This was so unexpected, to me it was. Unless the split between the two cofounders was quite tilted, or if by now after having raised several rounds of money Naveen's percentage ownership in the company had become really low, or the guy has come up with the next big thing, I mean. I have thought of FourSquare as a company that could end up with an IPO.

Now let me go read. The guy himself has a blog post on the topic, I think. Let's hear straight from the horse's mouth. If I were him I'd have left my equity still in the company. Because that money is growing. I wonder what he did.

GigaOm: Naveen Selvadurai, Foursquare co-founder is leaving
Business Insider: The Co-Founder Of One Of New York's Hottest Startups Is Checking Out
Pulse2: Foursquare Co-Founder Naveen Selvadurai Stepping Down
TheNextWeb: Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai announces he is leaving the company to work on new projects
AllThingsD: Foursquare Co-Founder Naveen Selvadurai Leaving
Naveen: Next
VentureBeat: Cue violins: Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai leaving the company
CNet: Foursquare co-founder Selvadurai to leave company
TechCrunch: SV Angel Also Buying Up Foursquare Stock. Dennis Crowley Emerges As Big-Company CEO

Okay, so the guy sits on the FourSquare Board.

Looks like the guy sold his stock to Spark Capital, one hopes only some of it.

Okay, so the guy feels like he has done all he can and he needs to move on.

It is possible some of the VCs in the picture have been gently working towards this end.

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Dennis Crowley: FBI Background Check

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeI knew there was something special about this guy. Now I know.

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Business Insider: The $600 Million Social Life Of Foursquare Founder Dennis Crowley

..... his success didn't happen overnight .... a series of failures and disappointments .... Crowley convinced the school to let him blog for the remaining credits. Teendrama, where Crowley was already writing about his college antics, became his independent study...... "People flocked to Dennis. He wasn’t up in the front of the room saying, ‘Hey, follow me.’ He just did stuff that was fun and people wanted to be with him. He’s always been that way, and that has never changed.” ....... “I remember thinking, what a cool life this guy lives,” says Jonathan (J) Crowley of his brother. “He was working at a hot tech company, going out all the time, he had lots of friends … and then it all disappeared.” ....... In 2001, the week Crowley turned 25, Vindigo went through a series of layoffs and Crowley was let go. That same week he was evicted from his apartment. .... Crowley spent the summer trying to line up interviews, but jobs were scarce. ...... On September 11, Crowley watched the twin towers crumble before his eyes. ..... Crowley's life, it seemed, followed suit. ...... In a matter of months he lost his job, his girlfriend, his home, his direction and eventually New York City and all the friends it held. Crowley was forced to move home to New Hampshire. He hadn’t a clue where life would take him next....... Crowley remained in New Hampshire for the next seven months. It was a tough transition and his spirits were down. ...... “He went from living in New York to living in a tiny little ski house in New Hampshire, and from making a good amount of money to making about $6 per hour teaching kids to snowboard,” says J.......... Dodgeball had continued to transform as Crowley’s side project, but up in New Hampshire he didn’t have the heart to work on it. ....... Bored, alone and broke, Crowley survived by making a few ground rules. From his blog:

Note to fellow unemployed kids: (aka Rules to Live By)
1. Leave your apt before noon every day.
2. No drinking before 5pm.
3. No watching TV before 5pm (except during lunch).
4. No taking taxis.
5. No eating meals when drunk.

Resilient, Crowley turned the bad times into jokes and wrote haikus for his troubles:

unemployment check.
you never showed up this week.
please come again soon.

every month i throw
eighty dollars towards this gym.
towels should be free.

atm machine
i already know i'm poor
keep your damn receipt

hello girl from nerve
i wish you were half as cute
as you looked online

99 cent nugs,
junior bacon cheeseburger
and a frosty, please.

ex-girlfriend. birthday.
send a card - or just "forget"?
my heart she broke. twice.

...... Crowley introduced the game to other NYU students and worked with a professor, Clay Shirkey, to develop it during an independent study. Rainert and Crowley refer to Shirkey as the Patron Saint of Social Media. With his help they tested out social and mobile features for Dodgeball, like Shouting, where messages were sent within a 15 block radius. ......... That summer Crowley learned about finance and angel investing. Their pursuit of capital led them to Google’s doors in September........ Google was fresh out of its IPO and it wasn't in the habit of investing in startups. When Crowley and Rainert met with Google they were told, according to Dennis, "We don't really finance companies but maybe you guys should just come and work here."
That moment was one of the high points in Crowley’s career........ He wrote about it on his blog, of course......... “Hey kids, my grad school thesis project (and what seems like my life's work), dodgeball.com, was acquired by Google today!........“Special shoutouts to everyone that's helped out. Tallboys for everyone. Forever!”..... But the high didn’t last, and selling to Google ultimately put Crowley at another low point....... “Everyone sees this side of Dennis that's so electric but there was a phase when he was in a rut. He was in a tough position. I don't think he could find the energy to get himself excited.” ..... Selvadurai had a desk around the corner from Crowley....... “He was the one guy who knew how to make iPhone stuff. He liked hacking city apps,” recalls Crowley. “I was doing a lot of mobile work and I also liked city stuff and we just started working together. We were experimenting for four to five months. It wasn't until January 2009 when we said, ‘Let's get serious about this and launch it for SXSW.’”....... The ordinarily social Crowley became reclusive.......“When Dennis stops socializing, you know he’s working on something really big,” says J. ......One week in January, a rare event occurred: A Friday and Saturday night passed with no sign of Crowley. ......An entire week passed and J still hadn’t heard from his brother.......“Then a group of us got an email that said, ‘Hey guys, I built this, what do you think?’ It was the first version of Foursquare; it was originally called Jimmy Disco,” says J. ...... Foursquare wasn’t always smooth sailing for Crowley. ..... “Everyone thinks the Foursquare experience is this rocket ship that started at SXSW 2009 and it hasn't let up, when in reality it was a little spike and then a summer of nothing,” says Crowley...... It took him and Selvadurai about nine months to raise the first round of capital for Foursquare. ...... “Then it spiked back up and it plateaued, and it spiked back up and it plateaued,” he says. “Of course if you average it out [the Foursquare experience] looks like a nice hockey stick curve. If you zoom in a little bit it is super, super rocky.” ....... “My whole career is a bunch of sizzles and spikes,” says Crowley. “I'm still trying to make sense of all of it, but when you look back it all starts to connect. Everything connects in hindsight. Of course you don't realize any of that going forward, you only realize that when you look back.” ...... last month he traveled across the country with five ridiculous-looking corn cob pipes to surprise his friends in Lake Tahoe. ...... "I've been trying to solve the same problems for many years and build software that helps optimize downtime. Of course the problem set keeps evolving and changing."....... Perhaps Crowley’s life-long wrestle with Foursquare stems from the fact that he so deeply embodies the product. Life, for him, is a constant game of checking in with people he loves. The personal reward he gets from being with friends and discovering new ways to have fun is what he wants every Foursquare user to experience.

The Best NYTM After Party Ever

I have been to numerous NY Tech MeetUps over the years. Biggies like Tumblr and FourSquare have all demoed at the NYTM. I don't remember Tumblr's presentation though. Maybe that was a MeetUp I missed. (Dennis Crowley: I Underestimated Him, Dennis Crowley: Role Model For Kids?)

I started going to the NYTM when it was six people at a bar on the Lower East Side, one of them the MeetUp.com CEO. And that was only a few years ago.

I have said several times at this blog that Digital Dumbo beats the NYTM after party. No more. Not after last night. (Digital Dumbo 18: The Dumbo Loft)

What made the difference?

It was not at a bar. It was in the same building. You left the hall and you went upstairs. When people have to walk three blocks to the after party, many of them leave.

The space was huge.

Free drinks, free food. Worth seeking out sponsors.

And that was pretty much it.

I think the NYTM should stick to this venue forever.

The NYU ITP Show Was Amazing

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeI meant to show up last year but for some reason the event fell through the crack of things. I am so glad I got to show up this year. If you could go to just one event in December, it would be this one. And there are some great Holiday parties in town this month.

December Events

I showed up early and stayed the entire time. I went from stall to stall. And when I was done I made repeat visits to some stalls. It was a mind blowing experience.

FourSquare Should Rent A Stadium

NYU is accessible like Columbia is not. NYU has a great location. And the ITP has the distinction of having had Dennis Crowley there a few years back. He probably is its most famous alum.

FourSquare Should Rent A Stadium

@paramendra
Paramendra Bhagat Are there @foursquare and @bliptv holiday parties this year? Or are they going cheap? There seems to be no public info. @dens@dinakaplan
Dec 11 via webFavoriteRetweetReply

paramendraParamendra Bhagat

Are there @foursquare and @bliptv holiday parties this year? Or are they going cheap? There seems to be no public info. @dens@dinakaplan

Dec 11FavoriteRetweetReply

in reply to @paramendra↑

@dens
Dennis Crowley@paramendra We did an employees and +1s only party this year. We getting big!
Dec 11 via Twitter for iPhoneFavoriteRetweetReply

paramendraParamendra Bhagat

Are there @foursquare and @bliptv holiday parties this year? Or are they going cheap? There seems to be no public info. @dens@dinakaplan

Dec 12FavoriteRetweetReply

densDennis Crowley

@paramendra We did an employees and +1s only party this year. We getting big!

Dec 12FavoriteRetweetReply

in reply to @dens↑

@paramendra
Paramendra Bhagat@dens Rent a stadium. I heard you raised some money. I want my party. There's still time! ;-)
Dec 12 via webFavoriteRetweetReply

December Events
Dennis Crowley: Role Model For Kids?
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Paris Action

Followed By Esther Dyson

You know the NY Tech MeetUp has arrived because Esther Dyson sometimes shows up. I spotted her at this one: Dennis Crowley: Role Model For Kids?

54 Followers On Angel List

And now I am up to 104 followers. The immigration gestapo people, take note.

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Image by Getty Images via @daylifeDennis Crowley: Role Model For Kids?
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SMS Power

Dennis Crowley: Role Model For Kids?

Image by O'Reilly Conferences via FlickrYesterday Dennis Crowley was on stage at the New York Tech MeetUp. The last time I saw that guy on that stage, I remember not being impressed. (Dennis Crowley: I Underestimated Him)

This time he was on stage to brag. He said he had done "four" internships.

I am like, get out of town. Who does four internships? Is this guy serious?

A whole bunch of interns took over the stage and made some dance moves. I got to meet a few of them after the event was over. ("Which one of you is at FourSquare?") I was going to say, you should plant some firecrackers under Dennis Crowley's chair. Just don't light them. You will be okay.

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Dennis Crowley At The Web 2.0 Summit

Watch live streaming video from web20tv at livestream.com

The White Male Conundrum

Image via CrunchBaseWhite Male Conspiracy To Drive Me Homeless
The Proverbial White Male

Most of the people I actively know today are in the NY tech ecosystem. The next thousand people I'd prefer to get on a first name basis with are mostly in the NY tech ecosystem. And there the Fred Wilson name stands out. And Fred is a white male. I don't think I have ever made Fred feel like, oh no Fred, you are a white male and you are worth millions and I feel queasy about it. Quite the opposite. I have had and I have expressed genuine, deep, heartfelt appreciation for his life's work. (A Surprising Blog Post From Fred Wilson) The guy is officially the top VC in the world. And I admire him for that. Excellence gets me. It makes me happy to watch excellence. On the other hand I note the guy walked into this town I believe in the 1980s with an empty pocket and a very loving wife. (Larry Ellison) I admire his success even more because of that. I find it very inspiring that he started where he started. (At MIT, So I Did It)

And I have had my disagreements with Fred, all very well documented at this blog. And I have talked of John Doerr's Larry Page mistake, and Fred Wilson's Jack Dorsey mistake. But then I am hugely biased in favor of the founding CEO type.

My point being my admiration for Fred has not been sycophancy, that is not my style. And my admiration for Fred has not been some kind of a subservience to the white male, something I have seen too many people of my background go for. Just ask Tim Berners-Lee, a guy who has a much more secure place in the history of tech than does Fred. (Tim Berners-Lee: The Internet Is Not A Country)

FourSquare Up To 500 Million Valuation?

Be There, Or Be Square: The FourSquare Day Party At Sidebar
FourSquare Day Tomorrow: Rad
A FourSquare Mayor?
FourSquare Has 6000000 Users

I think they were at two million users or less when they got their 100 million valuation. Moving from two to eight million jacks up your valuation by four hundred million dollars, looks like. That is really something.

FourSquare is not mainstream yet, although the tech insiders might not believe that to be the case. It is still early days of Twitter for FourSquare. Eight million is not a lot of people, but the trajectory of moving from two to eight million people is what you have to notice. The movement has happened fast.

What A Party

Be There, Or Be Square: The FourSquare Day Party At Sidebar

Be There, Or Be Square: The FourSquare Day Party At Sidebar

I have been to the Sidebar for quite a few political events before. It was raining when I emerged in Union Square from the underworld. And I am thinking, to have to get in line outside in this rain for someone like me who does not believe in umbrellas. But there was no line. I was able to get in right away. For a minute I thought I was at the wrong venue. How can there be no line into a FourSquare party?



I got to talk to a whole bunch of FourSquare team members. One of the first was this dude who did "server software" for the company. He was actively thinking in terms of a datacenter for FourSquare. I was impressed. I met another guy on that same server software team. We talked some tech. I got to meet Eric again. I told him Union Square Ventures has officially been declared the top VC firm.

FourSquare Day Tomorrow: Rad

Let's see. I don't drink but I like meeting people. Oh hey, this year they are doing it three different venues. I like that. What are the chances I can go to all three? Or maybe I will pick two. Or just one.

Last year on my way out of the party I saw Vin Vacanti still in line.

"I am leaving so you can get in," I said only half jokingly. They were down to only letting people in after someone left.

I just got this info below from Dennis Crowley's tumblog.

5-8pm @ Agave (8th Ave @ Charles Street) 140 7th Ave
7-10 @ Sidebar (15th Street @ Irving) 120 East 15th Street
9-11 @ Village Pourhouse (3rd Ave & 11th St) 64 3rd Avenue

A FourSquare Mayor?

New York City

4/16: I Found Myself A Party: Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night

Saturday, April 16 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm

Sidebar
120 East 15th St
New York, NY

Dennis Crowley: Mayor Of Mars?

(Via TechCrunch)