back to article You can't keep a Secret and nor can anyone else: the app is closing

In an almost-unprecedented move, a silicon valley founder is exiting a company before it's burned all its money: anonymous chat app Secret is looking for a graceful exit. David Byttow says Secret's “significant amount of invested capital” (remaining from US$35 million of funding) will be returned to the investors, rather than …

  1. Captain DaFt

    Well good for him

    Too many would ride that horse into the ground, then sell its carcass to a glue factory, rather than dismount and put it out to pasture.

    We need more business types like him.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Take the Money...

    ...(spent so far) and Run.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Take the Money...

      Fair and accurate!

      Except no-one's running. And returning ANY of the money is very unusual.

  3. Katie Saucey
    WTF?

    So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

    How frigging new was this guy to the internet?

    1. Nick Ryan Silver badge

      Re: So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

      New or not, he was utterly, totally delusional and any even vaguely sane person would have accurately predicted that this would happen. Not just him either as the investors must have been braindead when spunking up that amount of cash for this as well.

      Even when Internet users are not especially anonymous, when hidden behind the bravado enhancing Internet (i.e. not face to face with somebody else), they will troll, abuse and generally grief others solely because they can. It's a continuation of talking about somebody when they're not there.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

        > he was utterly, totally delusional and any even vaguely sane person would have accurately predicted that this would happen.

        Now Nick, I must tell you I have a lot more respect for the types who go out, try, and fail, than for the ones who just sit there and say "Oh, I told you that wasn't going to work".

    2. fajensen

      Re: So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

      The Generation Gap - The kiddies who were never on NNTP cannot imagine the true nature of people ;-)

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

        "The kiddies who were never on NNTP cannot imagine the true nature of people "

        Some of the most obnoxious commentators in some Yahoo Groups are reported as nice considerate people when attending related events. They aren't even anonymous in their postings.

        NNTP news groups had several sorts of people who made inconsiderate postings. Firstly those who had a mission to destroy the group because its subject made them feel uncomfortable. Secondly those who wanted certainty in support of their particular world view on the subject.

        Anything else was usually just exasperation at apparently being misunderstood or contradicted without evidence. Perfect fodder for those who trolled for their own sense of mischief or disruptive power.

        NNTP was where many people had their first taste of discussions that included a wider range of opinions and knowledge than they usually encountered. Being sociable in those groups was a learned skill - although like the occasional person at work some never seem to learn.

        Children now encounter social media while they are still developing their own view of the world. In this respect it is more like the school playground than a VIth Form debate. They parrot what they have been taught. They also tend to adopt that which is "cool" to signal they belong to a desirable new grouping.

        ..and that is the nature of the human social animal - for good or ill purposes.

      2. Nigel Whitfield.
        Coat

        Re: So he didn't really expect massive trolling?

        NNTP? Luxury!

        Some of us still remember moving from B-News to C-News.

        (Mine's the one with the Dowty Trailblazer in the pocket)

  4. This post has been deleted by its author

    1. frank ly
      Happy

      I come here for the occasional but regular gems. (I enjoy digging.)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Joke

      Oh shut up, you're as bad as the Nazis

      1. Yag
        Trollface

        Come on, Nazis were not that bad...

        1. Graham Marsden
          Mushroom

          [Insert obligatory Straw Man argument claiming that you must therefore think that druggiepaedoterrorists should not be burned at the stake]

      2. squigbobble

        reductio ad hitlerum

        Obliges the fifty Hitler post, or it would if I could post images.

        1. phil dude
          IT Angle

          Re: reductio ad hitlerum

          isn't that 4chan's piece of the world?

          P.

          1. squigbobble

            Re: reductio ad hitlerum

            Probably, I stumbled on that term in the encyclopaedia dramatica.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Anonymity on the web is dying

    I'm not sure I'm going to regret it.

    AC, natch :)

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