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gnulaw (57.71)

Tesla Motors' Jonathan Sobel. What Exactly Did He Do For/To Geeknet (LNUX) Before Abruptly Jumping Ship to Tesla?

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December 30, 2009 – Comments (6) | RELATED TICKERS: AMZN , BBY , GKNT

Jonathan Sobel joined SourceForge in October 2007 .   (LNUX Performance during Sobel's years Oct 2007  - Sep 2009).

Sobel's first substantive act in creating LNUX shareholder value was his controversial / questionable giving away / transfer (1,2,3,4) of  Linux.com to The Linux Foundation announced March 3rd 2009.Sobel's next move was his acquisition of ohloh.net announced May 28th 2009 (5,6,7,8,9,10).

But then events appear to get strange as reported here on July 10th, 2009 ref/ "SourceForge (LNUX) CFO Continues Dumping Position, Group Media President Joins on Eve of Announcing Q2 CC" (11).

And then at the July 30th Conference Call for Q2 ending June 30, 2009 there was no disclosure that Jonathan Sobel was leaving the company (12) in light of Jonathan's Sobel's abrupt August 30th announcement of his resignation nor joining Tesla Motors* (13, 13a), which he certainly was aware of less than thirty days prior.

On September 17, 2009, eight days before Sobel's formally announced departure from Geeknet (LNUX) Sobel appeared at a conference in New York Geeknet held where Sobel and Geeknet still represented Sobel was Geeknet Group President, Media.

Contemporaneous with all this Board Director, Suzanne Present, was beneficially accumulating greater than 26 percent of Geeknet (LNUX) common (14, 15).

So, again, what did Jonathan Sobel know and when did he know it? Why did Yahoo! (NASDAQ:YHOO) delete legally relevant and substantive threads on Yahoo! Finance relevant to this situation? (16, 17).

And did Jonathan Sobel and Scott Kauffman create shareholder value?(18).

 

/s/chaosUnplugged, Shareholder Value Activists, Of the Shareholders, By the Shareholders, For the Shareholders (sm), (tm), (c) copyright 1996-2010 gnulaw.org. All Rights Reserved.  #1 Motley Fool Score Leader Motley Fool Red Hat Pick.

 

 

* Note: It appears Tesla Motors deleted their own press release regarding their announcement of hiring Jonathan Sobel? 

 

Footnotes.

1.  Linux Foundation Forges Deal, Takes the Wheel at Linux.com, March 5, 2009.

2.  Linux Foundation to Build New Linux.com Community, March 3, 2009.

3.  Linux Foundation Acquires Linux.com: Behind the Scenes, March 5, 2009.

4.  Inside the Linux Foundation Purchase of Linux.com, March 3, 2009.

5.  SourceForge wants to be collaboration powerhouse, buys Ohloh, May 29, 2009, Ars Technica.

6.  Behind the scenes on SourceForge's acquisition of Ohloh, May 29, 2009, c|net news.

7.  SourceForge Acquiring Open Source Dev Portal Ohloh, May 28, 2009.

8.  SourceForge scoops up Ohloh, May 29, 2009. The 451 Group.

9. SourceForge Files fy'09 10-Q...Ohloh Acquired for $2.6M, 3.7M Shares Repurchased...$4.6M Impairment loss re: Collabnet, June 8 2009.

10. SourceForge Grows Up - and Out, June 19, 2009.

11.  SEC RULE 10b5-1, SourceForge (LNUX)'s Morris (CFO)s July 1 SELL, and [delayed?] Q2 Ending June 30 Announcement 

12.  Scott Kauffman "SourceForge's (LNUX) Three Guiding Principles: Speak Openly, Take Risks, and Don't Look Back" #4 - Don't Provide Guidance in re: Q2 Conference Call for period ending June 30, 2009.

13.  Breaking News...SourceForge, Inc.(LNUX) Announces Departure of Jon Sobel, Group President, Media

13a. Tesla Motors Hires Veteran Technology Executive, Jon Sobel, as General Counsel and Secretary, SourceForge Shareholder News, September 1, 2009.

14. Follow the Money:Gladwyne/Sams (Present/Sileck) SourceForge (LNUX) Control Exceeds 22%* (shares) 28% (Board)

15.  Geeknet (LNUX) Insiders Hold More than 25% of Outstanding Shares After Acquiring Another 1 Million+ Shares Today. Amazon Takeover? Going Private? Or What?

16. Geeknet (LNUX) - What did Tesla's Jonathan Sobel Know and When Did he Know it? Should Tesla's Imminent IPO be Accordingly Delayed Pending FINRA/SEC investigation?

17. Why is Yahoo! Deleting Messages* with Profound Legal Implications From Geeknet (LNUX) Message Board?

18.  Geeknet (LNUX) - Large Institutional 13D Shareholder Put Pressure On Board Demanding to Unlock Value. Where is Geeknet now 21 Months Later?

 

 

 

6 Comments – Post Your Own

#1) On December 31, 2009 at 9:17 AM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

...and then there is the disturbing issue with suddenly making Jay Seirmarco, Geeknet's long-time General Counsel to Geeknet CTO on the heels of Jonathan Sobel's departure September  25, 2009. This says more than it doesn't say...

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#2) On December 31, 2009 at 9:41 AM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

...and why didn't Jonathan Sobel financially/legally engineer a NASDAQ:G33K IPO for Geeknet (LNUX) but bailed to engineer Tesla's IPO*???

 

* The Top Ten IPO Candidates For 2010

 

 

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#3) On January 02, 2010 at 4:59 PM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

The big question is: Will sourceforge.net, slashdot.org, ohloh.net, and freshmeat.net go the way of Linux.com? (see above footnotes 1,2,3,4) given Geeknet management has consistently and incomprehensibly failed in not only creating shareholder value from these hugely(1.) substantive assets(2.) but has actually destroyed LNUX shareholder value (3.). 

(1.) 33 million monthly unique visitors, 103 million page views per month, 2.8 million downloads daily, 2.2 million registered users Source: http://geek.net/our-network/sourceforge/

(2). SourceForge.net World Alexa Traffic Rankings Source: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/sourceforge.net

Note: SourceForge.net's rankings within the BRIC nations (bolded below). digg.com cannot even boast this accomplishment. 

 

How Sourceforge.net is ranked around the world (1/2/10):

70  Bangladesh

75  Austria

86  South Africa

89  Germany

113  Switzerland

133  Netherlands

135  Italy

141  Pakistan

146  Ukraine

148  Sweden

155  Indonesia

158  India

158  Portugal

165  Australia

175  Romania

176  United Kingdom

182  South Korea

204  Greece

208  China

214  Iran

215  Canada

232  Spain

235  United States

245  Turkey

263  Brazil

266  France

268  Russia

285  Poland

403  Thailand

418  Mexico

428  Egypt

525  Saudi Arabia

595  Japan

 

 

(3.) SourceForge (LNUX) Changes Name and Announces Launch of Geeknet, Negative Earnings Surprise Source: http://caps.fool.com/Blogs/ViewPost.aspx?bpid=288006&t=01005232244381733972

Shareholders vote with their $. Geeknet (LNUX) Downgraded, Shares Sink Further Below Liquidation Value. Source: http://caps.fool.com/Blogs/ViewPost.aspx?bpid=288838&t=01005232244381733972

Geeknet (LNUX) Q4 Ending December 31st 2009 Guidance, Cash Burn, Q2 Actuals ending Jan 31, 2009, and What Really Needs to Happen [Now]. Source: http://caps.fool.com/Blogs/ViewPost.aspx?bpid=290017&t=01005232244381733972 

 

 

 

 

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#4) On January 02, 2010 at 6:10 PM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

[CORRECTION] (ref/ immediately preceding comment #3).

 

 

The big question is: Will sourceforge.net, slashdot.org, ohloh.net, and freshmeat.net go the way of Linux.com? (see above footnotes 1,2,3,4) given Geeknet management has consistently and incomprehensibly failed in not only [not] creating shareholder value from these hugely(1.) substantive assets(2.) but has actually destroyed LNUX shareholder value (3.).  

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#5) On January 05, 2010 at 7:38 PM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

The other obvious question is why did Jonathan Sobel acquire ohloh.net, another failed open source company, on the heels of donating away Linux.com and not engineer a ThinkGeek IPO and then dumps LNUX shares on the effective eve of an earnings announcement, and then bails to Tesla to engineer [their] IPO???...in the meantime shareholder hostile LNUX persists with its continuing patterns of no news, still has up its Christmas-themed website, still has a non-working iPhone application yet is available for download at the App Store. tbc...

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#6) On January 05, 2010 at 7:41 PM, gnulaw (57.71) wrote:

What did Tesla Motors know and when did they know it?

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