For Those That Came Before, An Exit Day

March 23, 2010 — 1 Comment

Inquisitr: Gothamist Blog Network Acquired For $5-$6 Million

I don’t know Jake much at all, although I’m pretty sure we swapped some emails in the early days. I covered the network in the Blog Herald days a fair few times, well, my memory is backed by Google as well here.

It’s just great to see one of the early few finally come up with an exit.

Which is why I found this comment from Nick Denton odd.

Don’t get me wrong: Nick is the master of all things blog, even if his first protege is burning through the remaining funding at a company I was once involved with, and bleeding traffic.

Thing is: I don’t care whether $5-$6 million isn’t the greatest exit after 7-8 years. It’s still an exit, and I don’t believe that even a couple of million each (and yeah, I get the CGT argument, been there, done that) is bad.

Probably not in NY, but I could buy a nice house with that and have change for the next thing. Hell, if someone wants to offer me low 7 figures for The Inquisitr tomorrow, please do; the divorce has been costly after all 🙂

In context, and this is where Nick may not get it, is that so many have fallen before them; that they lasted so long and could exit at all is a credit to Jake and Jen. It may not be the biggest exit, but it’s a respectable one in the broader context of those that came before.

Nick, I hate to say it, but you haven’t exited yet. That Gawker may be worth a stray $100 million on paper is way different to actually exiting.

Give them their credit without condition; they deserve it, and I think deep down you know they do, even if they never reached your heights. Besides, I’ve seen their network traffic, that valuation just helped you at least a little bit 🙂