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Facebook Buys a Private File Sharing Service
angry tapir writes "Facebook has purchased most of drop.io, an online content-sharing service, but the social-networking giant sounds more interested in acquiring the company's developers than its technology. Drop.io is a service that lets users create a 'drop' where they can share documents, videos and other digital content. The user can set a time for how long the drop will exist, decide who can view the content, set permissions for who can alter the content and share content in a variety of ways, including on Facebook."
"Buying a company for its employees seems so much like a recapitulation of the feudal system."
I'd say it acknowledges the fact that the people in a company are worth more than some moronic idea about an imaginary intellectual property their lawyers concocted.
I'd say it acknowledges the fact that the people in a company are worth more than some moronic idea about an imaginary intellectual property their lawyers concocted.
While I would agree with you, why couldn't Facebook then just hire them? Why did their need to be a transaction between the company's purported owners and Facebook? Facebook is basically buying the company to buy its employment contracts, its relationship with its workers. That treats those employment contracts as a fungible commodity, and that doesn't sit very well with me.
It'd look really bad to say "Sorry, investors... I got a job offer at Facebook so that $9.95 million in funding you put into drop.io? Yeah, I hope it works out for you because I'm out of here." Not to mention the fact that most founders want to stick around and grow the business to a healthy size before they exit. This gives the founders and the investors a viable exit strategy rather than "I'm quitting to be a Facebook employee" which, though it's many steps up from quitting and working at McDonald's, has kind of the same ring to it.
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Serfs were bound to the land. Serfs couldn't leave even if they wanted to. Is Zuckerberg buying land? I don't think so! Are the baronies adjacent to Lord Zuckberberg's estate going to return his fleeing employees to the custody of His Lordship's baliffs? Gimme a f-ing break, man. Stop using the word serfs, it's not the word you're looking for, and it makes anyone who misuses it look uneducated.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!