Tech Employees Want to Cash in Early

'Felt like I was on a date'

(NEWSER) - If you’ve got an interview with Mark Zuckerberg, bring your hiking boots. Apparently when the Facebook CEO is excited about a prospective new employee, he tries to seal the deal himself with a walk in the woods, several people who’ve gone through the process tell the Bits blog of New York Times . Zuckerberg will take these would-be employees on a trail that leads to a sweeping view over Palo Alto, and there deliver his proposal. More»

Sick of Groupon knockoffs yet?

(NEWSER) - Sure, maybe the little kid down the block just happened to think of setting up a, um, limeade stand right after you started hawking lemonade, but in the real-life world of startups the consequences are somewhat more serious—and annoying. Business Insider runs down the seven moldiest startup trends out there right now:

• Daily deals: The field is clogged, and Groupon and Living Social have clearly won. No room at the inn.

By delaying, Facebook keeps secrets, avoids regulation

(NEWSER) - The $500 million Goldman Sachs and other investors just dropped on Facebook will stave off its long-awaited IPO for a good while longer, the New York Times observes. Until recently, tech companies would jump to go public as soon as possible, but Facebook has so far decided it’s not worth bothering with the ever-shifting winds of Wall Street and the strictures of government regulation—and others are following suit. More»

Venture capitalists are pouring money into social networking startups

(NEWSER) - The New York Times makes the rounds of venture capitalists and entrepreneurs and hears worry that another dangerous bubble is forming with tech startups. Because relatively young companies such as Groupon, Twitter, and Zynga have billion-dollar values, nobody wants to miss out on the next big thing—hence the flood of money into anything remotely connected to social networking. (Which explains why Groupon is able to turn up its nose at Google's offer of $6 billion.) More»

And most leave rich, thanks to liquid shares

(NEWSER) - Though Facebook is only six years old, some early employees are leaving to start their own businesses. Co-founder Dustin Moskovitz created collaboration software Asana, co-founder Chris Hughes started social networking site Jumo; among other employees, there are a question and answer site, a social gaming company, and more—at least half a dozen in total, the New York Times reports. Yahoo!, eBay, Google, and PayPal saw similar departures; early PayPal employees even went on to stake Facebook. More»