Rumors & Acquisitions: Fear of Facebook
FACEBOOK FEVER. Facebook is opening an engineering office in New York. ”For us this isn’t a satellite office, this is going to be a core part of our engineering stack,” said a company exec today. So how does the still-nascent New York tech scene feel about the arrival of such a giant?
“I mean, Google is freakin’ massive, and they’ve almost had no effect on the community,” Hacker Union head and 10gen engineer Brandon Diamond told us by Gchat. “They’re trying to get out there, but they seem to be awful insular. I wouldn’t be surprised if Facebook is the same way… it will probably help more than it hurts. Fb obviously isn’t banking on the ‘tremendous number of hackers living in NYC.’ Instead, I think they believe they’ll be able to woo many new hackers with the added bonus of being in a cool city. It’s a boon.”
As to whether the new office will lure back some of the talent Facebook poached in the form of Drop.io, Hot Potato, Daytum and Mail Rank, but survey says no. “I don’t suspect? Highly doubt it, actually,” says a source, regarding the Hot Potatoes. Read More
