The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 19 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Benchmark structured $1.5 million in founder loans to win the eBay deal
“It was also reported by the Washington Post after the IPO of eBay that Benchmark had also structured Equity-backed loans to Pierre and Jeff in the amount of 750,000 dollars each as a way to, like, prevent them essentially, give them an incentive not to take th…”
Rosenthal: Google effectively killed eBay through superior search
“Honestly, I mean, I think this is drawing too broad of a brush, but I think Google killed eBay, right? You know, the best way to search eBay is Google. It's not eBay.”
PayPal succeeded because incumbents repeatedly missed opportunities to preempt the startup
“There were so many points in time where like the window should have closed for PayPal to be started. There's no reason that that company should have been successful or existed yet.”
Without Amazon outbidding eBay for Accept.com, PayPal might not exist
“If that had gone otherwise, I don't know about PayPal. Like, there's probably no PayPal. There might not be a PayPal mafia.”
Gilbert: Pre-Facebook VCs routinely replaced founder CEOs with professional managers
“There wasn't Founders Fund yet. There wasn't A-sixteen Z yet. There wasn't like the notion of founder friendliness. What venture capitalists did is they invested in founders companies and then brought in management to take them to the next level. It's what hap…”
eBay was profitable and growing 10% monthly at its Series A round
“And an interesting thing to note is, at this point, eBay is growing 10% a month. So check, fast growth company. It's profitable. All these checks that are getting mailed in, like, it is generating cash and growing.”
Benchmark's eBay investment generated $1.5 billion in carried interest for partners
“That's one and a half billion dollars of carry dollars to be distributed amongst the equal partnership after the eBay investment.”
Benchmark offered $6.7 million for eBay at a $20 million valuation
“They give Pierre and Jeff a term sheet to invest 6.7 million dollars total in the company in a series A financing at a twenty million dollar pre-money Evaluation.”
Knight Ridder offered Pierre Omidyar and Jeff Skoll $50 million for eBay
“The reason you would get acquired is they offer Pierre and Jeff Fifty million dollars. Five zero million dollars.”
Benchmark lacked an eBay-sized investment win until backing Bill Gurley's Uber
“Benchmark did not have an eBay-sized win until Bill's big marketplace.”
Benchmark's $6.7 million eBay investment reached over $4 billion after IPO lockup
“By the time the lockup expires the next spring in 1989, that stake is worth over four billion dollars on an eighty-five million dollar fund.”
eBay might have become a non-profit resource if not for server costs
“It is funny that like if Pierre hadn't Needed to pay for the server costs. There's a really good chance this could have gone the way of the Linux foundation or Craigslist. And I know Craigslist is a real business now, but like it could have been Wikipedia coul…”
eBay executives pitched Bezos on outsourcing Amazon's marketplace to eBay
“In the fall of 2000, Meg Whitman and Jeff Jordan fly up to Seattle and they pitch Bezos on the opposite idea. EBay takes over the failed Amazon auctions and all of third party sellings.”
Rosenthal: Amazon bought Accept.com primarily to block eBay from payments
“Amazon steals the deal and acquires accept.com mostly so that eBay doesn't get it.”
Gilbert: Superior software cannot unseat an established marketplace network effect
“When you have the network effect of more buyers attracting more sellers and more sellers attracting more buyers like eBay had, and they were a couple years ahead, it was just already in full swing. And even if you have a more technically superior interface.”
Early Gmail Invites Traded on eBay for an Average of $150
“They were trading on eBay for average price of a 150 bucks in the early days.”
Pierre Omidyar created eBay while employed full-time at General Magic
“He was still a full-time employee at General Magic when creating eBay.”