Assertion certainty 4/5 debate potential 2/5

Graham: Morris voted for lowball ViaWeb acquisition offers to quit

Paul Graham · A Conversation with Paul Graham - Moderated by Geoff Ralston · Y Combinator · Sep 1, 2018 · at 11:35

Paul Graham describes early acquisition offers for ViaWeb and co-founder Robert Morris's desire to exit.

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“Whenever we got an, whenever you get an acquisition offer, the board has to at least consider it, right? And so, you would get these crap lowball acquisition offers. We'll give you, like, two million dollars in our stock, right? And Robert was like, yes, no, no, Robert would say, like, we would vote on it, and Robert would always say, well, you know, I have to be honest here, like, this would at least mean we could stop working on this thing, and so, yes, I would take this deal, right?”

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