Groupon Still Losing Money, CEO Is Fired And Leaks Final Email

New submitter Inzkeeper writes with news that the CEO of Groupon met the axe today: "Groupon CEO Andrew Mason made public an email he sent to Groupon employees. He takes responsibility for the company's downturn, expresses his appreciation for his staff, and wishes them well. 'For those who are concerned about me, please don't be — I love Groupon, and I'm terribly proud of what we've created. I'm OK with having failed at this part of the journey. If Groupon was Battletoads, it would be like I made it all the way to the Terra Tubes without dying on my first ever play through.'" Despite increased revenues, they are still losing about $81 million each quarter, and Wall Street needs blood.

Re: For those who are concerned about me

[geekoid]

He is the founder, and probably know a lot of people therr personally.

Re:If Groupon was Battletoads

[eldavojohn]

I nominate this for nerd meme of 2013. If slashdot was battletoads. If the republican national convention was battletoads. If shopping at Wal-Mart was battletoads. And then all those of us who never played it will have to make friends with gamefaqs all over again to understand WTF everyone is talking about.

There hasn't been a Battletoads game released since 1994 but recently Battletoads has seen reemergence on boards like 4chan and Reddit. It has been used by Anonymous to prank scientology [knowyourmeme.com].

I'd imagine he could have included that in there to try to make himself look like an average guy who's in on all the jokes (not the reality). It has also been used for trolling -- perhaps he was trolling? Put up a screenshot of Battletoads and ask "Is this Battletoads?"

And then there's also the possibility that he really likes the game, wants to see a sequel and therefore decides that he can give it a ton of publicity by mentioning it in his farewell e-mail.

Who knows or cares at this point?

I found this hilarious from the article:

In addition, Mason also has support on the eight-member board — director and former AOL exec Ted Leonsis has always been a key mentor to him, for example.

What is this? Game of Thrones?

Re:Battletoads?

[Binestar]

No one with a 5 digit UID I can assure you that.

Re:Funny, but I am reminded of the old joke...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know anything about him, but it was the best CEO firing letter ever.

After four and a half intense and wonderful years as CEO of Groupon, I've decided that I'd like to spend more time with my family. Just kidding - I was fired today. If you're wondering why... you haven't been paying attention.

and

For those who are concerned about me, please don't be - I love Groupon, and I'm terribly proud of what we've created. I'm OK with having failed at this part of the journey. If Groupon was Battletoads, it would be like I made it all the way to the Terra Tubes without dying on my first ever play through. I am so lucky to have had the opportunity to take the company this far with all of you. I'll now take some time to decompress (FYI I'm looking for a good fat camp to lose my Groupon 40, if anyone has a suggestion), and then maybe I'll figure out how to channel this experience into something productive.

I'm sure he made plenty of cash and now is a good time to get the hell away from GroupOn, toxic as it is.

Re: For those who are concerned about me

[rekoil]

His severance package is $378.36 [cnn.com]. not $378 thousand or $378 million, Three Hundred and Seventy Eight dollars and Thirty Six cents.

Re:They should have taken the $6B from Google

[fldsofglry]

A couple of reasons the deal didn't work out: http://www.businessinsider.com/groupon-google-deal-turn-down-2012-6 [businessinsider.com] Supposedly, a break up fee of $800 million dollars wasn't enough for groupon to want the deal, and Google was afraid of being in antitrust court for years over whether the deal would actually go through. I was also told by a source somewhat close to the matter that Google wanted to groupon to offer a "break up fee" as insurance in case groupon's books weren't on the up and up. Some say that "insurance fee" sealed the fate of the deal as groupon didn't want Google to see their accounting procedures.