Get Neglected: Go Get Acquired by Google

By Steve Poland • February 6, 2008

I was just thinking about Jotspot — remember that enterprise wiki site that got tons of buzz, because the founders were some of the Excite guys? They were acquired by Google back in October 2006 and I haven’t heard of them since. Turns out I’m not the only one, I checked out their listing on Wikipedia, and someone posted as of February 4, 2008, “The JotSpot homepage and many user accounts have gone missing, and it looks like no word from Google as to what happened.”

The list goes on with acquired start-ups that get neglected by Google — remember the mobile service Dodgeball (and the infamous photo of the founder giving the middle finger to Google after he resigned).

Or Jaiku, which was supposedly a Twitter competitor, yet even fellow Googlers won’t give the company any love — instead their colleagues talk about Twitter in their product demos.

Another one I could swear I’ve read didn’t go well for the founders was dMarc Broadcasting — a radio advertising software and platform.

Anyhow, I may just be full of crap, because if you check out the list of acquisitions Google has made, these are a mere blip out of the whole, and Google may have been acquiring teams, rather than a focus on technology, with some of these acquisitions.

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Comments

4 Responses to “Get Neglected: Go Get Acquired by Google”

Eric Nagel on February 6th, 2008 10:53 am (perm link)

I once had a job where all of the projects I worked on just sat there. Nothing was ever implemented. When I was done with one project, the boss-man would give me another to work on.

After a few months, I realized I was hired by this company so the competition couldn’t have me. I quit & got a job where the stuff I built was actually used.

Maybe Google is just buying these companies so nobody else will? It’s a good strategy to keep the technology out of the hands of their competition.
xavierv on February 6th, 2008 12:17 pm (perm link)

Nice post! I made me wonder about yesterday’s Google-Twitter partnership for Super Tuesday.

Eric Nagel’s right, Google probably bought Jaiku just to neutralize its progress.

Google+Twitter=What Happened To Jaiku?
Justin Goldberg on March 4th, 2008 1:30 am (perm link)

I promise to never sell my soul. Okay, maybe if the price is right. l0l.
Dan on March 12th, 2008 12:10 pm (perm link)

I know for a fact that Red Hat bought a number of “up and coming” companies and just wiped them out while keeping the talent there under strict contracts.