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Written on 4th September 2008
2 COMMENTS 
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
One of the first 2.0 entrepreneurs that really made an impression on me was Scott Heiferman, CEO and co-founder of MeetUp. When I attended one of my classes at New York University in 2006, he gave a guest lecture. He told us that online services should be all about helping people. The goal of his start-up was to connect people in real life by using the web. Well, that obviously worked out fine.
But now Heiferman and his team feel like there’s the need for a second campaign. The avalanche of Twitter-like services made us screen addicts again. This awesome video says it all:
Meetup has built a funny site around this video, giving you the opportunity to unplug one of your friends with a pre-written email (you can choose from several sentences though):
It’s an epidemic. It can strike anyone. It begins harmlessly enough… maybe with a cell phone, an online social network profile, or an IM. But before long, the electronic screens invade every corner of your life.
There’s a name for this tragic and extremely annoying condition: Screen Addiction.
But there is hope. Send an intervention to someone you care about! Help them take the first step towards recovery.
I’ve always digged Meetup’s mission to connect people offline via an online service. Now they’re giving it an ever better twist by launching this (soon to be viral) campaign. It’s not boring, it’s not cheesy, it absolutely rocks.
Written on 5th July 2008
1 COMMENT
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
One thing I used to love about living in New York, was my favorite coffee bar: The Lotus on Clinton and Stanton. In the weekends, I grabbed my Macbook, sat down for a good ol’ cup of American coffee, and started browsing away. Sometimes I started a talk with one of the other visitors – as New Yorkers are always eager for a chat about life. I miss that in Holland, where most people tend to be more closed and busy with themselves. But now it looks like an app from Norway-based software agency Ground Control might help me to get back into that New York vibe. Moot connects you to people who are using the same Wifi spot as you. Isn’t that cool?
When I attended one of my classes at New York University in 2006, Scott Heiferman, CEO and co-founder of MeetUp, gave a guest lecture. He told us that online services should be all about helping people. The goal of his start-up was to connect people in real life by using the web. Well, that obviously worked. Moot has the same purpose, so what will happen with this service?
A local Pownce
So Moot sort of works like a local Pownce: it’s all about sharing media. After creating an account, you can select the music, video, and images you’d like to share. Short note here, you can only share stuff for which you have the copyright. People who are on the same wireless network can browse through these files and download whatever they want. If they like what they see/ hear, they can express their appreciation by giving you “respect”. There’s the solid basis for a good chat. Instead of walking up to random people, you’ll will now know whether you like someone’s weird/ good/ tremendous taste. How’s that for randomly meeting interesting people?
Where’s the Mac app?
Unfortunately, Moot now only works on Windows platforms (also the mobile ones by the way). They’ll have to launch a Mac app as soon as possible, since they’ll desperately need the early adopters. Moot is only fun when a lot of people use it, and there are some barriers for people who aren’t used to services like Twitter. Most early adopters own Macs – visit a tech conference if you don’t believe me — thus the guys from Ground Labs have some work to do.
As soon as they’ve got that figured out, I’ll hang up some flyers in my coffee bar – so I’ll never miss an interesting person anymore.
By the way, the design of the Moot site is uber trendy, don’t forget to watch the magnificent intro movie – and no, I’m not exaggerating here.
Written on 12th January 2008
9 COMMENTS
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Money makes the world go round. Really! Even when it comes to Facebook, we don’t discuss privacy. No, we talk about monetization. Because THAT is the main issue, according to Dave McClure from Master of 500 hats:
While Facebook annual growth at 130%+ is impressive, as is pulling in $300M in cash for just 2% of equity, the fact that Facebook really hasn’t figured out where its core future revenue stream is coming from is a problem. It’s a problem for the company, for its growing developer community, for the advertisers it’s working so hard to get, and ultimately — if it doesn’t figure it out — for its users.
McClure writes that every platform monopolist has a money engine. Google for instance, has Adsense, Microsoft is earning big bucks with Windows & Office and Intel loves the chips.
Clearly, McClure is the expert here. He’s the one who has 20 years of experience and I’m just around for two years. Yet, I have the feeling that finding the ultimate money source shouldn’t be the number one priority for Facebook. If you asked me, I would say that loving your users is the smart thing to do. Treat them right, listen to their wishes and fulfill their needs. If they say that those damn Snowball, Super Wall and whatever application you can make up, is starting to irritate them, you give them an anti-clutter tool.
As McClure says: “Google took nearly 3-4 years to figure out its monetization engine (Adwords)”. Isn’t that because they were improving their services for the users, and while doing so, came up with a brilliant idea to make some money out of them? Let Facebook do they same. Improve their service, and with that, wipe out the competition. And of course, always keep your eyes open for that money engine. The traditional American business motto ‘be good for your customers’, is still valid in this new era.
More money talk: Mika from Dosh Dosh describes 16 types of websites you can create for profit. “Successful web entrepreneurs think like investors”, says Mika. So they build auction-, dating- and affiliate review websites…
However, I was once told by Scott Heiferman, CEO and co-founder of Meetup.com, that you shouldn’t start an Internet company with an advertise driven mind. During a seminar at New York University in 2006, he explained that his business statement is: “Are you gonna help people or not?”
Let’s all think about that for a while. Are we gonna serve users? Are we going to help them fixing their street, meeting people with the same hobby or protecting their children? Or are we’re just interested in making money out of them?
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