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PandoDaily’s First Ebook Is Out Now! Your Definitive Guide to Facebook’s IPO

We had a lot of luxuries when we started PandoDaily. One was knowing without a doubt what the biggest story of the year would be: Facebook’s IPO.

We knew we had to do something special for it, particularly because several members of our staff and contributors are among the world’s leading experts on the company. So rather than simply bang out a bunch of blog posts and live-Tweet how the stock trades on Friday, we decided to do something a little more in-depth.

The result is published today. It’s our first ever eBook “Buy This Book Before You Buy Facebook: A PandoDaily Expert Guide to the Internet’s Biggest IPO,” available on Amazon Kindle right now, and on other platforms very soon. Continue reading →

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PandoDaily Staff: “The Worst Web Experience I’ve Ever Had”

Amanda Schwab is totally pissed at me.

Amanda approaches most challenges I give her with a special kind of Lacrosse-like, can-do intensity. But yesterday, I may have pushed the normally unflappable editor of our PandoLists too far. “Please don’t ever make me do that again!” she beseeched me last night at the end of a long, long rant.

Mean bosses take note: I am going to give you the secret to totally alienating your staff. Make them use a Samwer Brother app. Continue reading →

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Marc Samwer Is Finally Out at Groupon. Time to Build a Great International Company Now.

I mean, I know it’s in the PandoTicker already. But I can’t very well hammer Andrew Mason for more than a year about the woeful job the Samwer brothers have done with the 47 country Medusa-headed monstrosity that is Groupon’s International operations and not say anything when the clone king is ousted.

Groupon has officially replaced the head of international operations, Marc Samwer, in a move that they say is “long planned.” (Never mind, Mason recently went on and on about what a dreamy operator he is….) His replacement is former Dell executive Austrian Veit Dengler.

I don’t know anything about Dengler. But this has to be an upgrade.

Here’s my official statement on the matter: Yay. It’s about time, Groupon. How bad did it have to get? On the other hand, boo as Samwer just has more time … Continue reading →

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It Turns Out Hollywood Has Always Been Stupid

Tony Hsieh should run a cult. Have you been to the Zappos headquarters tour? There’s no way people just happen to be that happy. And now he’s convincing all the most important people in my life to move to Vegas.

It’s bad enough that he roped Paul Carr into his outrageous $350 million Sim City in Sin City adventure. But they have stolen my husband from me too. He just started as the director of photography for the Downtown Project.

That leaves us with two unassailable facts:

  • Like most reporters, I am scarred by many awful memories of covering horrible conferences in Vegas.
  • Eli and I now have to spend about a week every month there.

And now I have to do it with the knowledge that there was almost a life-size, full-scale Starship Enterprise constructed downtown. Continue reading →

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Viral Marketing At Its Best: Animating a Twitter Timeline

I’m not normally one to post cool things I find on the Internet here on PandoDaily, but this was just too cool to pass up on.

On Twitter, I saw someone Tweet that the official Smart Car Twitter account for Argentina* had posted something cool. Thinking that it would be a good background picture or something like that, and I went over ready to close the tab, if it proved to be boring. Continue reading →

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An Open Letter To Randi Zuckerberg: How Could You Do This to Real Entrepreneurs?

I have known Randi Zuckerberg since the early days of Facebook, and I liked her immediately. And as a new mom balancing the working world, I feel a certain kinship with her.

But as I’ve said from the beginning of this site, I won’t let investors’ interests dictate our coverage, and it’s just as bad if I let personal friendships do it.

Particularly because I believe what Randi Zuckerberg has done to Silicon Valley in producing this TV show for Bravo is just unconscionable. I haven’t written anything until now for two reasons. The first is that I felt like our contributor Francisco Dao mostly nailed it yesterday. The second is because I am just stunned. I keep hoping to hear from her publicly that Bravo just utterly twisted her vision. Unfortunately, I’ve only seen her retweeting about it with glee and winky-faces and triple exclamation points. Continue reading →

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As Wall Street Points Fingers at Groupon, Three Fingers Point Back

Now I know how Goldilocks felt.

About the time Groupon was raising its $1 billion growth round and getting the big endorsement from some of the Valley’s biggest names, I was bringing up all the problems with its haphazard Samwer-poisoned international expansion. As a consumer, I haven’t exactly had a love affair with the company either.

But in the last few days, as Groupon’s stock falls further – just a nickel off its 52-week low in after hours trading today — the Wall Street torches and pitchforks have come out yet again for the company. And I find myself in a strange position. I’m actually defending them. (Sort of.) Continue reading →

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On Writing from the Boonies

In Upstate New York, it’s easier to find a drug dealer than it is a decent Internet connection. This is the region that has decided to make a name for itself, growing grapes and outsourcing any labor-intensive work to the Amish, while the rest of us attempt to find something, anything to do.

I recently wrote a piece about how the Web is removing barriers to entry for a variety of professions, and I still stand by my original assertion: This is the best time to be working as a creative professional. One thing I didn’t make clear was that location still matters, whether I like it or not. Continue reading →