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Smart Musings from Bradley Horowitz

There’s a worthwhile sidebar column (sub. req’d) in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal where Bradley Horowitz, Yahoo’s product strategy vice-president, makes some interesting comments as it relates to the kinetic Web 2.0 activity. (As you know, Yahoo has added to this kinetic activity by buying Flickr and Del.icio.us.) The article highlights that Horowitz’s Yahoo team looks…

There’s a worthwhile sidebar column (sub. req’d) in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal where Bradley Horowitz, Yahoo’s product strategy vice-president, makes some interesting comments as it relates to the kinetic Web 2.0 activity. (As you know, Yahoo has added to this kinetic activity by buying Flickr and Del.icio.us.)

The article highlights that Horowitz’s Yahoo team looks at hundreds of proposals per week sifting through “everything from the ridiculous to the sublime.” Horowitz readily admits he’s tired of seeing business plans from companies saying they are the “Flickr for blank.”

Horowitz’s most interesting comments were in response to being asked, “What’s wrong with someone starting a company just to sell it to Yahoo?” Horowitz rightly says this is what’s wrong …

”You want people in it for the right reason. Selling to a big company typically isn’t the right reason. We like people who are passionate about their product. If you have people with a pure financial motive, in my experience, the product suffers. Certainly, someone could figure out a way to scratch a user’s itch and sell the product to us, and perhaps it would make great sense. But we are also looking not just for new products but also to be able to bring the world’s best and brightest people into Yahoo.”

Horowitz closes the interview with built-to-last advice for built-to-flip focused entrepreneurs …

”Find something you would do irrespective of financial motive or whether it will be the next big thing. In that case, you win either way.”

Follow your folly. Now that’s great win/win advice for all us business folk.