Google, GroupOn: It's The G Factor

Image by earcos via FlickrI am going to post a hypothesis. The hypothesis is that GroupOn always wanted to get bought, and it wanted to get bought by Google. From. Day. One. GroupOn plotted for this day to come before its inception.

Why do I say that?

Google, GroupOn: GroupOn Perhaps Was Not The Next Big Thing

Image via WikipediaApple and Microsoft were born around the same time. They were not at peace. Netscape came along. Microsoft killed Netscape. Google offered to sell itself to Yahoo. Yahoo refused. A few years later Bill Gates offered to buy Google "at any price." Google refused. Google tried to buy or bury Facebook. Facebook survived. Facebook tried to buy Twitter. Twitter refused. So Facebook hunkered down and "learned" as much as possible from Twitter. Facebook has tried to buy FourSquare, more recently it has tried to bury it.

See, there is that buzz factor. The company that had the crown seat in the buzz kingdom until recently is able to spot the next taker and gets uncomfortable.