Dennis Crowley answered a Quora question from a San Francisco user on Monday that starkly shows how charged the fundraising climate is right now versus just a few years ago. “I know the press is usually interested in the cost paid for Dodgeball by Google,” user Kay Patel asked. “But I am interested in knowing why you sold it? Is it because it was a different time when apps on phones weren’t a big thing?”
“We sold because we couldn’t find anyone (angels, VCs) willing to invest in what we were doing,” Mr. Crowley said. “Admittedly we were super green–two kids that came out a strange art/tech program at NYU, not b-school hustlers that knew the ins/out of fundraising… We randomly met the Google folks while we were out trying to raise funding for Dodgeball. Their pitch was, ‘We don’t invest in companies, but you guys should come here and work on this stuff at Google.’ Sounded great to two guys living off credit cards and NYU pizza.”
The question is one of two posed to Mr. Crowley by this user, who also asked Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai if he has a driver’s license or drives a car. “I have a U.S. driver’s license,” Mr. Selvadurai responded. “I do not have a car. I’d like to think I’m a pretty good driver; I enjoy speedy drives on winding country roads.”
