Sequoia gives photo-sharing startup more money than they gave Google

Isn't 7 founders a little excessive?

'Say you walk into a restaurant with twenty people in it. You sit down at a table with four friends, and start chatting. Then one of your friends pulls out their phone, fires up Color, and takes a snapshot of you and your buddies.

That photo is now public to anyone within around 100 feet of the place it was taken. So if anyone else in the restaurant fires up Color, they’ll see the photograph listed in a stream alongside other photos that have recently been taken in the vicinity.'

Correct me if I'm wrong, but when it comes to photo sharing, aren't the people in your immediate vicinity at the time you take a photo the people who are going to be the least interested in getting that photo shared to them?

What in the world does a picture app need to use my mic for?

I feel the same. Unfortunately, after spending a few minutes with such an app and not having a positive impression, it's pretty rare that I would revisit the app again later in the future. Most of the people I know behave the same way: if it catches their attention, it stays on the phone or else the app's gone.

The best launch scenario for them would have been SXSW .. instead, all the group messaging apps got the limelight and these guys seem to have missed that boat ..

Also, what's the privacy aspect of this app?! I could think of a few concerns.. e.g. someone's photos popping up when the user doesn't intend to be seen at a particular place ..

Disclaimer: Three of us are building a pet project that has some similarities with Color. One big difference - all user generated content is private by default.

That out of the way, we are certainly envious about the 100-200 million dollar evaluation they got on day one. With about 4k spent so far, in our case and with three of us chipping in any extra time we have (me - any extra time I have outside of lurking here), we are still a couple of months away from a MVP that will make us cringe ever so slightly when we see how far we will have to go. Till then, no real sleep, and a lot of heartburn. Still, its good to see Color validating some of what we do, but in the end, we both will have to prove there is a market. We however can afford to fail early and not give any VC's any heartburn, just our own families.

One thing is for sure, we do not plan to build sonar capabilities. We dont have the knowhow and I am not sure that will be the make or break for us anyway.

We also dont have the same pedigree, and therefore its clear that VC's will not be snapping at our heels (But we go back six years, all three of us). We are ok with that, but heck..41 million is a lot of money.

As the weeks peel away, I hope to share here on HN where we stand with the product and hopefully even line up some kind souls here who will be willing to beta test for us in return for some good karma. We cant afford to pay (please refer back to the 4k burn total).

We however have some ideas on how we plan on monetizing. We plan on finding out as early as we can, whether our ideas coincide with real needs from local businesses.

Right now, I am shamelessly stopping people on the street, as they veer away, ignore, stare, and sometimes stop and tell me what they need and what they want. I do this as behind the scenes we toil away on building something that in the end we can be proud of.

In all fairness, right now, they have a far more capable app, employing 9 times our current strength and vastly more capital and brain power. In the end, may the best viable product and company win.