Build to flip?

scripting.com

20 points·_pius··3 comments

First, New York has become much more interesting in the tech world. I spent just two days hopping from rock to rock, and didn't land on most of them, but wow, there's something going on there.

That was an interesting bit. I'm a New York resident and have always felt the startup/entrepreneur scene here was strong, but I am of course biased. I wonder what it is he's picking up on recently? Is it just the total startup activity in New York or does he see something more fundamental happening?

I think there's been a slight shift in outside perceptions of New York on the strength of a handful of consumer-focused startups (bit.ly, Tumblr, Etsy, Hunch, etc.) and a handful of well-known early-stage firms (Union Square Ventures, First Round Capital, Betaworks, Founder Collective, etc.)

Before the Hunches and Betaworks showed up, New York was still a great place to build a company, but it had more of a reputation for advertising technology (DoubleClick, Right Media, Tacoda, Quigo.) I don't read a lot of Dave Winer, but I suspect ad targeting might not float his boat as much as it floats mine.

Bitly needed to do a lot of work to build bitly pro. They already have beta users. So I think they were already following the obviously sound advice.

If they were built to flip, the announcement would be about the intention to make money.

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