New York’s newest multi-millionaire officially announced his $1.1 billion deal with Yahoo Monday with a resounding “f—, yeah!”
David Karp, the 26-year-old wunderkind from the upper West Side who founded the blogging platform Tumblr, didn’t seem too concerned with ruffling the feathers of his new corporate overseers.
“Before touching on how awesome this is, let me try to allay any concerns: We’re not turning purple,” Karp wrote, alluding to Yahoo’s signature color.
“Everything that Tumblr is, we owe to this unbelievable community. We won’t let you down. F—, yeah, David.”
He has 200 million reasons to be pumped: The high school dropout is probably worth at least that much now.
But the laid-back genius has never been motivated by cash, according to two former colleagues.
TODD MAISEL/NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Even before the sale, Karp had a cool ride in this motorcycle with a sidecar.
“He’s not your normal hardcharging ‘I’m going to be successful no matter what it takes’ kind of guy,” said Fred Seibert, 61, who gave a 14-year-old Karp his first internship at Frederator Studios, which produces cartoons online and in television.
It was at the internship that Karp — with the support of his mother, a teacher at the private Calhoun School on the upper West Side, and his composer father — decided to drop out of Bronx High School of Science and work full time.
After finishing his internship, Karp scored a job with John Maloney, who founded the site UrbanBaby. Soon Maloney promoted Karp to head of product — at the age of 15.
“The quality of his work was spectacular,” said Maloney, who was president of Tumblr until last year. He said Karp would finish tasks he expected to take several days in a matter of hours.
Karp’s artistic sensibility, which Seibert said was nurtured by the whiz kid’s parents, helped him design Tumblr.
Bloggers on the network — who are known for their fanatical devotion — adore its easy-to-use interface, which allows people to share photos, video and text with minimal effort.
PETER KRAMER
Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer promised David Karp her company would not ‘screw up’ Tumblr.
“He’s not your normal Asperger’s engineer,” Seibert said. “He grew up around creative people and wanted to build things to help them.”
The head of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, hailed the mega-deal in casual language, echoing Karp.
“We promise not to screw it up,” Mayer, 37, said.
Yahoo aims to monetize Tumblr’s 108 million blogs, which are maintained by a young demographic that makes advertisers salivate. Yahoo could also use the site’s cultural cachet.
Even Mayor Bloomberg joined the lovefest for the New York kid who made it big without leaving for Silicon Valley.
“He’s turned his innovative ideas into indispensable services used by millions of people every day,” Bloomberg said.
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Karp recently bought a $1.6 million condo at 330 Wythe Avenue in Williamsburg, Brooklyn
But amid all the feel-good vibes surrounding the acquisition was the harsh reality facing many online startups.
Tumblr has yet to turn a profit, was dependent on capital investments and made a meager $13 million in revenue in 2012, according to Forbes.
But Maloney said it was a bargain.
“Yahoo got a good deal, in spite of the visual of $1 billion,” he said.
At Karp’s swank building in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where he bought his condo for $1.6 million, there was no sign of the prodigy except for his retro Russian sidecar motorcycle.
“He’s a good dude,” said one of his neighbors. “He drives a cool bike.”