Perhaps, but this is easy to say now.

You would likely call them fools for leaving $12 billion on the table had they taken the $8

They went for the two in the bush when they had one in the hand. It's one thing to reject $60K when you could go for $200K. It's another to reject $6B to hope for $20B. Even though the ratios are the same, the maximum downside of each is considerably different.

Or, as others have speculated, Google got a look at their books and wouldn't touch it with a ten-and-a-half foot pole; to save face, Groupon claims to not be interested in the offer.

Isn't the IPO expected to value Groupon at over $15 billion?

Or did you mean "should not"?

Not sure the IPO is going to happen now, and if it does it could be at half that, or less.

This is what happens when you get startup fever. You let early success go to your head, start turning down reasonable offers left and right, and then you go belly up.

Or you become Apple, Google, Microsoft, Intel, Facebook, or a dozen others tech giants. For some people money is just a byproduct of their other, much more subtle, goals.