Google buys Meebo

http://blog.meebo.com/?p=4974

by jcdavis • 14 years ago

294 112 14 years ago

blog.meebo.com

capo• 14 years ago

"... has entered into an agreement to be acquired by Google!".

Does that mean that they are expecting some sort of regulatory review before it's a done deal or is it just standard speak?

tomkarlo• 14 years ago

Standard language. Mergers usually can't be completed until after certain regulatory reviews are complete. In the US, one of the most common (for larger deals) is HSR: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hart-Scott-Rodino_Antitrust_Imp...

michaelbuckbee• 14 years ago

To me this makes sense as Meebo has really transformed themselves from a "chat" company to an "advertising toolbar" company.

They (for better or worse) absolutely dominate the annoying popup toolbar at the bottom of a website market.

Ex: http://www.slate.com

joelhaasnoot2• 14 years ago

There was a couple of steps in between I think - didn't they also do some sort of news/feed syndication or "following"? Till Gmail and Google Talk became popular, Meebo was my MSN replacement of choice.

citricsquid• 14 years ago

Still exists: https://www.meebo.com/messenger

Full timeline: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meebo#Timeline

jholman• 14 years ago

What the heck is wrong with ICQ as an "MSN replacement"? If the new thing (MSN) sucks, and the old thing (ICQ) still works, why go to a NEWER thing?

Now, I have no trouble understanding why you'd eventually go to gChat; it's clearly superior.

duaneb3• 14 years ago

I have never seen that before - maybe my brain just tunes it out.

danudey3• 14 years ago

Adblock usually blocks it, for what that's worth.

JulianMorrison• 14 years ago

Adblock meebocdn.com and they go away.

joejohnson• 14 years ago

I'm not sure if I'm adding meebocdn.com to my blacklist correctly. But I was able to block Slate's toolbar through the AdBlock interface...

ticks• 14 years ago

That toolbar has improved a lot since I last saw it, it used to make the websites all jerky and difficult to browse.

AznHisoka• 14 years ago

That toolbar is godawful, and I have no idea how they managed to sign up so many companies to display it. I mean.. it's not like they had access to all these advertisers since they were primarily a chat company. It's something that can be duplicated by any one of us. What gives?

rhizome2• 14 years ago

That is a story I've been waiting to read for some time now. AFAIK, it doesn't exist yet.

jpark• 14 years ago

It's the result of an incredible bd and ad sales team. If you look at the senior team, esp in sales, it's a lot of very senior CNET veterans who took along most of their experience and contacts from CNET to Meebo.

This is not something duplicated easily.

danudey3• 14 years ago

I grabbed the Meebo chat app for iOS the day it came out, and it was a great, free alternative to existing options like IM+ and Beejive. It had a few minor bugs though, like tapping 'send' was actually tapping Return, so if your cursor was in the middle of a line it would send a message which was broken in half where your cursor was.

They fixed it after a few months, but you could very obviously see that what was happening was it was inserting the newline, and then they were removing it, and then the message was getting sent. It was an obvious hack and it made me feel like they really didn't understand how to make a good iOS app, and didn't care enough to do it properly.

Meanwhile, they started adding other 'features'. They added the ability to 'check in' to a website, like foursquare for web pages. Except it only worked inside of the built-in browser in Meebo, which meant it only worked for links that your friends sent you via IM while you were on your phone. How much time did they spend implementing a feature that I can't imagine anyone ever using instead of adding actual functionality to their app (or fixing the constant crashes I got all the time)?

That was the point where I basically wrote Meebo off. Sure, they probably couldn't make money providing a free chat service, but they could have branched out in other areas, rather than the idiotic-seeming stuff they've been working on lately.

MaysonL• 14 years ago

Very strange: the bar only shows up for me in Chrome, no trace of it in Safari (whether or not AdBlocker is enabled, whether or not I'm logged into Slate).

Ahh! Long enough ago that I totally forgot about it, I installed the Block Meebpo Toolbar userscript in NinjaKit

adrianwaj2• 14 years ago

Does the toolbar even allow chatting with site staff like Olark? (seemingly no) whilst a useful thing to do right now: Olark is also expensive.

mooreds• 14 years ago

17 bucks a month is expensive? I find olark to be inexpensive and effective. No I am not an employee, just a happy customer.

gfosco• 14 years ago

Interesting... does Meebo have any patents? I really would've expected that Google could re-develop any Meebo technology for cheaper than an acquisition.

grhino• 14 years ago

I'm guessing the relationship Meebo has built with its customer base is more important than the technology.

lbbb• 14 years ago

I've been using the (old) Meebo Messenger for years. I've never had the impression that they cared about its users a lot. There were no updates on the user interface since I began using it, they didn't add features that were highly requested on the feedback forums.

The toolbar thing is just... I don't know what that is. Looks useless to me.

Another thing, are there any good other web based multi messengers? I guess they will shut this down soon then?

franze3• 14 years ago

I don't think that (even) more developers for G+ will solve ... anything.

speg• 14 years ago

No, but more users might.

franze3• 14 years ago

buying a user base + migrating them to another platform is a very slippery slope (privacy and PR wise). think it's mostly about developers.

Karunamon2• 14 years ago

The "G+ is dead/dying" canard again? Really?

ericd2• 14 years ago

Honest question - is it not?

franze3• 14 years ago

no, just that the G+ product issues can not be solved with more developers. more developers do not fix a product.

it says nothing about the usage nr. of G+. but that the G+ has product issues is clear as day, even to - most - fanboys.

KenCochrane• 14 years ago

Looks like the site is getting crushed, I can't load the page.

markus2012• 14 years ago

There's probably whiskey involved.

dm8• 14 years ago

I loved Meebo back in 2005 but they became annoying as hell with their toolbar. I always felt that product was more of a "solution in search of a problem".

Anyways, I'm happy for Meebo team. I'm following them for a while and they seem to be really good guys. Especially, their founding team.

zinssmeister• 14 years ago

Why?

rokhayakebe• 14 years ago

Meebo definitely went through its nine lives. I wonder what Google was trying to acquire through this purchase.

heretohelp2• 14 years ago

Not too sure. I used to contract for Meebo (I did so for about six months) and I'm kinda puzzled as to what they were looking for.

starpilot• 14 years ago

The talent. Meebo was started by Stanford grads who demonstrated their talent in developing a product and a launching company. It'd be a safe way to hire a few competent engineers, and I doubt the acquisition price contains much goodwill.

Spooky23• 14 years ago

I doubt the talent behind meebo is worth $200M. I'd say that it's more a bailout of the investors.

jpeterson2• 14 years ago

The talent. Meebo was started by Stanford grads...

Can we please get over this dopey fixation on big-name elite schools?

stonemetal• 14 years ago

Ah yes the old "You are so good at building things people want we will throw buckets of money at you. Oh, all that stuff you built nobody wants that shit, throw it away." reason.

earl2• 14 years ago

Guessing: Meebo has been trying to make money via their behavioral targeting dataset. Meebo sees browsing activity of users via sites that embed their javascript and also through the plugins they get people to install in their browsers. It's a similar dataset to clearspring, who also do bt stuff. In 2011, Meebo bought mindset media who build psychometrics (eg [1]), with the idea of marrying psychometric targeting with meebo's bt dataset. Thus meebo's value to google: experience building and selling psychometrics; and a client list for psychometric targeting. Psychometrics is another targeting layer that would be sold in Google+ alongside dems targeting.

[1] http://www.mindset-media.com/marketers/profile/

SpikeDad• 14 years ago

Not good news. I do hope Google leaves the Meebo name intact so it's easy to block their garbage with Adblock.

I assume shortly we'll be seeing new postings from Google on what new personal information they'll be adding to the Google brain from Meebo.

kul• 14 years ago

There was a lot of Meebo coverage on TC over the years: http://techcrunch.com/tag/meebo/page/5/

Early rounds were rumoured to be done at $200m valuations so with liquidation preferences I'm not sure how much this really leaves on the table after the investors are paid.

RossDM• 14 years ago

This makes me sad for the future of their chat client. The toolbar may suck, but their IOS client rocks. It synchronizes with their web chat interface, so that you may switch between conversations on mobile/desktop.

jry2• 14 years ago

One thing no outlet has reported is that everyone except business development and select engineers were laid off as a result of the deal.

This all comes from someone who left Meebo recently and is still close with people that work there.

Not sure exactly how many, but it sounds like it was a good number.

Note: I said it was the majority, that's what my friend made it sound like, but I'm not sure.. will update once I find out

debacle• 14 years ago

Meebo laid off most of its staff as part of this deal?

jry2• 14 years ago

Most might be too strong, but it seems pretty bad. The chicago office is gone as a result of the acquisition I'm told.

Reports are starting to roll in about other locations

http://betabeat.com/2012/06/meebos-engineers-headed-to-googl...

nandemo• 14 years ago

That sounds pretty bad if true.

Is there a point of working for a startup if there's no financial upside, only the downside?

Not being in the US, I'm curious if people getting laid-off from funded startups get severance packages.

mikeryan• 14 years ago

They're not getting laid off by a startup now they're getting laid off by Google. They likely get a severance. In CA at least if they're laying off a significant portion it's cosidered a plant closing which should give everyone about 6 months severance.

heretohelp2• 14 years ago

I contracted for these guys, I bailed out of their full-time offer to follow my contract for a reason.

jamesflorentino• 14 years ago

I honestly did not see that coming. I was a regular user of meebo way back in 2006-2008 but I don't have a solid recollection as to why I left (now using imo.im).

I can only assume that the acquisition has something to do with Google Plus. Well, whatever it is for, I wish them good luck.

dirtyhand• 14 years ago

Google is scared of Pinterest.

scribu• 14 years ago

What does Pinterest have to do with live chat?

ketralnis• 14 years ago

Even less than either has to do with their current business model of being an advertising network through their toolbar.

duaneb3• 14 years ago

This is the first I've heard about Pinterest. What do they have to do with Meebo?

huhtenberg• 14 years ago

> Thank you all for coming along for the ride!

Reads like a farewell note to me, not very encouraging.

jpkeisala• 14 years ago

For a moment I was thinking they bought Meego.

ALee2• 14 years ago

I met the Meebo team at SXSW in 2008 and, being the uppity entrepreneur, I asked if I could stay in touch with them...

Even though they were super busy, Seth would take a call over the phone when my startup was about to get acquired or when we were trying as hard as we could to raise money in late 2008.

When I was playing a game of Underground Assassins in 2011, nobody knew my name. So they went by my t-shirt's logo - Meebo. Honestly, six years after they began, people still remembered their logo.

I still find it amazing how Meebo for a period of time inhabited the social consciousness. Like art, I'm glad to have experienced it, and being in the bay area, felt a little closer to it.

mkopinsky2• 14 years ago

Off topic, but what is underground assassins? Google is not helping.

intended• 14 years ago

I'm guessing - and I could be wrong - but based on the fact that its a real world thing - its likely the game where you get a bunch of people to play at hunting/assassinating each other as they go about their daily life.

The objective is to tag enemy players and become the last player standing.

ALee2• 14 years ago

Sorry, typed in haste. Undercover Assassins, see this: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/09/12/...

kevinsd• 14 years ago

I have no doubt that startups including meebo got talents. But how does google maintain its bar of engineer qualification? Or does it?

11235813213• 14 years ago

I was expecting this or a shut-down announcement soon. Meebo has never been able to provide something valuable to enough people to become a going concern.

mibbitier6• 14 years ago

I don't think that's true. They had a lot of people using their messenger client.

More to do with mistakes and execution. Why did they take $70m in funding? That's a ridiculous amount of investment to take.

Why couldn't they monetize that amount of eyeballs?

11235813213• 14 years ago

I know they had a lot of users, but I don't see how they were making money off the client and they had a lot of employees.

Maybe the spam thing was working for them but I don't think they would have folded if so.

danudey3• 14 years ago

Or go beyond monetizing eyeballs. Turn it into a live chat service, so visitors to your website can instantly communicate with you. Or do what Chatterous did and let people create custom IM group chats. Maybe they did these things and I didn't notice, but anything seems better than 'Let's put a toolbar at the bottom of other peoples' sites!'

earl2• 14 years ago

it's very difficult to monetize eyeballs without intent. If you're going to do that, you'd better do what fb did, and generate a fuckton [1] of pageviews.

[1] Definition: lots and lots -- 1T / month in summer 2011 [2]

[2] http://mashable.com/2011/08/24/facebook-1-trillion-pageviews...

11235813213• 14 years ago

They have now announced shutdown of the messenger. http://www.meebo.com/support/article/175/

soulclap• 14 years ago

Meebo was useful, back then. Sometimes. But right now I am tempted to just respond with 'A/S/L?'.

taylorbuley• 14 years ago

I liked how they phrased the news in the body of the post -- "Meebo has entered into an agreement to be acquired by Google" -- more than how they phrased it in the headline: "Google is acquiring Meebo." I'd like to think that if I was selling a startup I would be master of my own destiny, too.

rorschachh• 14 years ago

google is smart enough to realize that buying user bases doesnt work so it must be the meebo metrics and their client install base? over the last few years it seems like meebo has been struggling to make chat more of a commodity than it actually is, IMO and at this price its more like a push for investors. as for g+ - desperate times call for desperate measures.

sakopov• 14 years ago

Nice, generic and overenthusiastic post-acquisition blog post. They'll likely be shutdown within a few months.

emehrkay• 14 years ago

I like meebo, I always have and still use it (for AIM). I consider myself a fan even though I used to hate: "They got 15 million for online instant messaging?"

I really liked how in the early days they would show off their growth, new office/employees, etc. when you logged in. It subconsciously acted as a source of inspiration.

ricardobeat• 14 years ago

I hope Meebo Messenger doesn't die. It's still the best web-based chat app, and the only way I still connect to my old MSN account.

evanwolf• 14 years ago

This is exactly the kind of talent and infrastructure you want for building WebRTC clients for Adsense. Think enhanced, in-browser, click-to-call ads. With video chat. Talk to other shoppers and customers, then talk directly with the restaurant or plumber.

Or they could join the Google+ team as G brings videoconferencing in-house.

jorgeortiz852• 14 years ago

My first full-time job offer as I was wrapping up college in 2007 was from Meebo. At the time, they were about 12 employees.

I didn't realize it at the time, as it was my first time going through the interview/offer dance, but having much more experience with these things now (from both sides of the process), I can honestly say it ranks as the best I've ever heard of.

a) The technical portion of the interview was the best I've ever been through. It culminated in them asking me to set aside 4 hours to come into their office and work alongside them (asking questions if I needed to), writing an HTTP server in C.

I almost shat my pants when I heard the question, but to this day its the most rewarding technical interview of my life. I started off with a problem I wasn't sure I could sove in the allotted time, I _built_ something, and it _worked_. (Well, it mostly worked. There was one elusive bug I couldn't figure out that day. I had to leave because of another commitment, but I promised to come back the next day and fix it. When I got back the next day, a senior Meebo engineer had spent 3 hours debugging my code until he figured out the problem. We code reviewed my code line-by-line as a wrap-up to the interview.)

b) The non-technical portion of the interview was the best I've ever been through. They were very concerned about the ever-elusive "culture fit", and the entire team made an effort to get to know me, taking me out to meals, etc. I met all three of the co-founders (Seth, Elaine, and Sandy), all of whom I'm sure were busy trying to build a product and grow a company, but they were incredibly warm, genuinely interested in getting to know me, and generous with their time.

c) They gave me a great offer. For a fresh-out-of-college student with not much real work experience, both the salary and the equity portions of my offer were extremely generous. I didn't even have to negotiate. At the time, Seth explained they didn't want to go through a contentious negotiation process, so they were opening off with a generous offer and it wasn't really open to negotiation. It was, indeed, a generous offer. (Five years of experience later, and I'm making less money, adjusted for inflation, than Meebo offered me as a fresh-out-of-school untried new hire.)

d) The post-offer process was the best I've been through. At the time, I knew nothing about startups, stock options, VC, etc. I didn't even know how much I didn't know. At his own initiative, Seth (the CEO!), took the time to explain the equity portion of my offer. The offer included a number of options and a strike price (standard), but unprompted told me about the other numbers I should be concerned with: total shares outstanding, fully diluted % stake, preference multiples, etc. There's much more transparency about this stuff today (blogs, etc), but at the time no one else explained this stuff to you (and as a stupid college student, you wouldn't know to ask). Even today, in a much more competitive hiring environment, I hear about companies that tell experienced engineers (who know what they're negotiating) that certain numbers which are essential to understanding an equity offer (like total number of shares outstanding) are "confidential".

I ended up turning down the offer, but I have enormous admiration and respect for Seth, Sandy, Elaine, and the whole team at Meebo. Congratulations on your many successes over the years, and I hope to continue seeing great things from you in the future.

onedev• 14 years ago

what offer did you think was more attractive than what they offered?

jorgeortiz852• 14 years ago

Ha! It's a long story. Let's just say I made a lot of mistakes over the course of the next few years.

You live, you learn.

jwegener• 14 years ago

YOU TURNED IT DOWN?! Didn't see that twist to the story coming..

shasty2• 14 years ago

Google should definitely buy ICQ next.

shasty2• 14 years ago

If they are like a company I used to work for Meebo probably has a patent that reads as follows:

System and message for sending a message using a computer system

Google buys Meebo

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