10 posts and columns on Sam Lessin

The Furious Five of Facebook? Meet Its New Product Princes and Their Domains.

in Social on December 9, 2011 at 12:38 pm PT

Product is power at the social networking giant — so here’s who has it and here’s what they rule over.
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Facebook Confirms Reorg, Names Five Product Heads

in Social on December 8, 2011 at 10:36 am PT

Facebook today confirmed our report from last night that it has shaken up its organization around major product areas.
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Don’t Freak Out! Facebook Swears “Timeline” Will Make You Happy

in Social on October 6, 2011 at 2:10 pm PT

At first, the upcoming Facebook Timeline interface may be disorienting for users, but soon they should see its expressive power, said Timeline product manager Sam Lessin in an interview on Wednesday.
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Finding the Scale of the Rest of the World Lacking, Early Designer Rejoins Facebook

in Social on February 14, 2011 at 5:00 am PT

Aaron Sittig, who left Facebook after being the company’s lead designer for five years, is now back at the mother ship, having rejoined in January with the title “product architect.”

"They Failed": VC Fred Wilson Gets BoomTown's First Annual Someone-Had-to-Say-It Award

in News on November 29, 2010 at 9:37 am PT

BoomTown has always enjoyed–although I have not always agreed with–the ruminations of Fred Wilson in his must-read blog, A VC. Today, the New York venture investor–heard of Foursquare or Twitter?–penned one that was flatly on point, simply titled”Chasing Returns” about a potential crisis in start-up funding. It’s a meme Silicon Valley might want to pay mind to.

Facebook Acqhirees Make a Quick Mark on Its Products

in Social on November 23, 2010 at 5:00 am PT

Facebook has a well-defined M&A strategy of bringing in talent from young, small companies and shutting down their products. But there’s also a pattern emerging for what happens to that talent. Acqhired CEOs hold prominent roles on Facebook’s product team; nearly every recent Facebook product launch seems to have been introduced by an acqhired employee.

Path: The Social App That's Not Viral (By Design)

in Social on November 14, 2010 at 9:00 pm PT

While there are many interesting photo-sharing apps out these days, Dave Morin and Path are the most convincing about there being a larger idea behind what they’re doing. San Francisco-based Path is stubbornly focused on close personal connections–a.k.a. real friends.

Mark Zuckerberg Really, Really Wanted to Work With Sam Lessin

in Media on November 2, 2010 at 10:19 am PT

Facebook paid around $20 million for Drop.io, just so it could shut down the service and hire founder Sam Lessin–a deal that’s not terribly unusual. What is unusual: Lessin’s old Harvard classmate Mark Zuckerberg funded the purchase with precious Facebook shares.

Dear Web 2.0: You Might Want to Stop Believin'

in News on October 9, 2008 at 2:14 pm PT

All in good fun, right? I am sure this will be the dumb-as-a-box-of-hammers reasoning this group of Web 2.0 folks gives for this odd video effort, doing a lip-synch romp on their group vacation in Cyprus to Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’,” and then posting it for all to see on Vimeo. It is titled: “Twenty world Internet citizens met in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus in October of 2008 for a week of reflections on life, love, and the Internet.” Um, kids, here’s a reflection: While you swim in that pricey infinity pool in your luxury villa, Silicon Valley is tanking all over the place. You might want to check your email and see if Sequoia Capital or Ron Conway has cost-cutted you out of a job!