The fact that the pitch includes a swipe at Google shutting down services kind of invites the "yeah but are y'all a future acquihire?" counter-skepticism. I think they could probably just have left that whole subject out of the pitch; it's an approach to competing with Gmail via "negative advertising" that I think has relatively little upside and opens up a can of worms. (On the other hand, it's an obvious enough counter-swipe that I'm not sure it's helpful for the entire HN discussion to be about it.)

Indeed. They've inadvertently refocused attention from an otherwise interesting discussion about problems and innovation in Email into one about acquihires and company lifetimes. There's a PR lesson in here folks.

Turns out it's more profitable to do R&D using VC than it is to do it in house.

Thanks! :)