First we read on Twitter that Facebook had ‘bought’ Gowalla, the location service. Next we read that Facebook had bought Gowalla and then shut it down. Then we heard that Facebook probably didn’t ‘buy’ anything, they just ‘pretty much’ hired Gowalla’s co-founders – Josh Williams and Scott Raymond. Nothing was said about the people who work at Gowalla. Nothing was said about what Williams and Raymond would do at Facebook, and nothing was said about money exchanging hands.
Reading between the lines, as one is forced to do, it becomes blindingly obvious that Gowalla was going nowhere (fast) and its co-founders went looking for a job. They applied to Facebook. Why not? It’s a company that’s showing some promise.
‘Buying’ Gowalla also makes Facebook looks good pre its IPO; as is expanding its office in New York. Facebook is opening an engineering office in New York. It currently has about 3,000 employees and is intent on hiring thousands more worldwide once it gets its enormous cash fund by going public next April.
Facebook probably didn’t pay any cash for Gowalla. They didn’t say, so we can only guess? But the best guess is they hired Josh Williams and Scott Raymond and gave them shares. And as Facebook shares are worth more, at the moment, than a maiden on an English rugby tour, you can see why Williams and Raymond might be satisfied. It wasn’t as if their company was going to challenge Foursquare.
In the hard core realm of the digital overlords, getting a job at the top table of any online giant means your CV must be a start-up. And it must be a good one.

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