Daniel Lyons

“There's no special technological wizardry involved in what Groupon does.”

“I feel like Valleywag has been different things with different writers over the years. Up and down. I think it's at their best when they get a legitimate scoop, like when someone leaks them documents. I feel like we could do more of that, breaking stories.”

“The technology, called near-field communication, involves a microchip that can send and receive data across very short distances, about four inches. Instead of swiping a credit card, you hold your phone near a reader and let the data zip between the two devices.”

“HubSpot is divided into 'neighborhoods,' each named after a section of Boston: North End, South End, Charlestown.”

“Facebook's position with rival tech companies boils down to this: if you want access to all the information we've collected, strike a deal with us.”

“You realize that if you're in the media business, technology is fundamentally what's driving the change in that business.”

“Android is the kind of runaway smash hit that techies spend their careers dreaming about.”

“The world of online marketing, where HubSpot operates, though, has a reputation for being kind of grubby. Our customers include people who make a living bombarding people with email offers or gaming Google's search algorithm or figuring out which kind of misleading subject line is most likely to trick someone into opening a message.”

“In the world according to Apple, content is just a bunch of digital bits, easily copied, nothing special.”

“Nobody ever imagined how quickly the Android mobile-phone platform would take off - not even Andy Rubin, the Silicon Valley engineer who created it.”

“What needs to change is the nature of advertising itself. That business hasn't really evolved since the days of Don Draper.”

“'Do not track' probably won't spell doom for online advertisers. But it will put the burden on them to explain to consumers what targeted advertising is and why it's good for them. They'll have to come out of the shadows; they'll have to be honest with people. What a radical concept. I'm all for it.”

“Apple is very, very good at almost everything it does, and that includes corporate communications.”

“There are too many ways that a startup gig can go sideways. If the startup won't agree to hefty severance, pass.”

“There are two types of young people - the partiers and the people who wanted a sense of purpose in their life.”

“Since the beginning of the internet era, it has been pretty widely accepted that when you join an online service, whatever data you put into it belongs to you.”

“Mesh networking is an old idea. Oddly enough, the low-cost XO Laptop built by the 'One Laptop Per Child' organization - the so-called $100 laptop - was designed with built-in mesh networking. The idea with the XO machine was that many kids using those laptops would be out in rural areas without reliable Internet access.”

“'Silicon Valley' likes being satirized. They've all been waiting for someone to come along and make fun of it.”

“A startup job is an investment, after all: Venture capitalists may wager money, but you're staking something more precious - your time. And unlike VCs, you can't spread your risk by betting on a bunch of companies at once. Start with TAM. That's 'total addressable market,' and if it's not big enough, there's no point in talking.”

“I think the issues around diversity of all kinds are really a huge problem in the startup world.”