I'm also a fan of Meetup.com. Based on the article, I don't think Scott necessarily wants to have a billion members. Instead, he doesn't want to go out of business because Facebook takes over their industry. Meetup is fairly independent and hasn't raised a lot of money. A competitor to Meetup that doesn't charge for groups (initially) and has huge resources to develop features and conduct marketing could kill them. I think Scott thought he needed to prioritize surviving, providing jobs and continuing his political activism. If that is the case, becoming more ambitious is a survival strategy. It's disappointing but not the usual tech exit.