Why Parakey sold out

Ron, great article selection, as usual. I think you're also trying to hook me in with the whole mobile theme, since you know how much I love this area of technology.

But let's skip that for the moment, because today I want to comment on Parakey.

I think the implications of Parakey's acquisition runs deeper than just cloud computing. Because on first glance, selling Parakey to Facebook doesn't make sense. Parakey is a startup with ambitions to merge the operating system with the Internet. With a declaration like that, I expected Parakey to take over the Internet with a glorious and breathtaking IPO. Why would they sell out on their destiny?

On second glance, something still doesn't seem right. Parakey has backing from Sequoia Capital, a major venture capital firm. Since its applications are supposed to run on the user's machines, it doesn't need to spent money buying massive server farms. All of this suggests that the company is doing relatively well financially, even after two and a half years of development. No need to fix what's not broken.

So why would Parakey sell to Facebook?

Third glance:
It's about the network.

Facebook has a massive social network, but not just any social network... a social network with privacy controls full of people you know and trust. Parakey has a platform for sharing ANY content you have on your computer. Put them together and *poof* you've got a true online collaboration in a way never before seen on the Internet.

Forget about loading your pictures from your hard drive to Facebook... it'll be shared automatically as long as you move your pictures into the right folder. Got a bunch of short stories you've written but nobody has seen? Well, with Facekey (or Parabook) you would be able to load these stories up, select the friends who can view them, and have them join you in a collaborative writing session. Heck, throw in some spreadsheet capabilities in there and soon you and your friends could be picking stocks based on trends that you've crunched on your individual computers.

My guess is that Facebook wasn't the one who wanted to acquire Parakey. I think Parakey wanted to be acquired by Facebook. Facebook provides the missing link to Parakey's technology... a way to easily control who can view the files you want to share. With this deal, I think it is poised to do exactly what it set out to do: allow for sharing and collaboration on a scale never before seen on the Net.