eBay's Dog-Friendly Workplace

Once upon a time there were two friends who made a music-sharing program called KaZaA. It was very popular, and the two friends followed it up with another program called Skype, which let everyone make phone calls pretty much for free over the Internet.

They became subversive heroes. Then a big company called eBay knocked on their door and said, We want to buy you. Name your price!

And they looked at each other and said, $2.6 billion! And eBay said, We'll give you $4.1 billion, but if you fail to fulfill our wildest dreams we'll only give you that $2.6 billion!

And the two friends looked at each other and rolled their eyes. They couldn't believe their luck.

They didn't think their program that let people make phone calls for free over the Internet would ever make much money. So they cashed out as soon as they could without inciting lawsuits. Meanwhile, they planned an online video company that would really make money - only not for eBay, but for them alone.

Poor eBay. It soon learned what it was stuck with. But it couldn't sell it without severe financial penalties until April 2008. So it waited. And it waited. And there were rumors it would sell Skype to Google, which was just maybe better at making money from it.

And when April 2008 came, eBay spoke its piece loud and proud. We love our dog, eBay said. And we'll stand by it!

And they all lived happily ever after. Sort of.