congrats to an amazing Open Angel Forum company! proud to be an investor.
Likewise, proud investor! And totally addicted user.
Rahul, Sam and Martin are really capable and some of the best at listening to users and to the market.
Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
31–40 of 46 posts
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#32congrats to an amazing Open Angel Forum company! proud to be an investor.
Congrats to the Rapportive team!
Thrilled to be on board as an angel investor.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
proud to have you on the team. let's crush it.
How do you get away with removing the ads from Gmail? is that not against their TOS?
We believe the context we provide is a much more valuable use of the limited sidebar space than the ads it replaces; and we think that adds value to the platform, both for Google and for its users. People evidently agree, as (nearly) nobody complains about the loss of the ads, but lots of people love the utility we provide - and indeed have switched to Gmail to get it.
We're not interested in cheating Google out of their ad revenue, although we suspect the Gmail ads aren't making that much revenue anyway.
We have a good relationship with Google, and we were a launch partner for their contextual gadgets platform: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2010/05/putting-email-i...
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#34Is that legal to replace the ads? I would think it is against the TOS of the site.
We believe the context we provide is a much more valuable use of the limited sidebar space than the ads it replaces; and we think that adds value to the platform, both for Google and for its users. We're not interested in cheating Google out of their ad revenue, although we suspect the Gmail ads aren't making that much revenue anyway. Update : I should also add that we have a good relationship with Google, and we wer…
"although we suspect the Gmail ads aren't making that much revenue anyway."
If that were true, I'm pretty sure Google would have either 'fixed it' so that they do make revenue, or removed them.
Personally, I'd expect those ads on GMail certainly make a few million.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes they do it but I just question how viable a company is that relies on blocking ads to display their data.
If it drives more people to the online version of Gmail then that's still a win for Gmail in some sense (if not monetarily). I currently use Gmail via IMAP so never see any ads but Rapportive could tempt me back online.
Yep, especially if it gives them a lot of useful information about you to target ads to you in the rest of the googleverse.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#36I was confused about some of the jargon in Paul Graham's "The future is no fixed amount, no fixed closing date, and no lead" quote so I looked them up best I could:
no lead - A lead investor is basically someone who commits, and says "we're in" at the start of the round. They commit organizational and negotiating resources. They also typically take a board seat. See http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2007/10/the-lead-invest.html
mass syndication - Instead of having a lead investor and a big closing event, you drum up interest from lots of parties who commit based on the understand that other investors are also buying in with the same terms. See http://blog.rafaelcorrales.com/2010/05/mass-syndication-is-p...
no fixed amounts - This seems to mean that a valuation is set, but the actual amount of money invested is not. I imagine it's sort of like a line of credit, but the startup takes as little as they need. Does anyone else know more details about this?
no closing - I'm reaching here a little, but I think what's implied here is that instead of getting everyone to commit to one big agreement, which is signed at once with great fanfare and large checked being signed, the startup just gets interested parties to sign on one at a time, and they go until they have sufficient funding. This is obviously more of a leap of faith for investors, so you have to set your valuation below market. See http://venturehacks.com/articles/no-lead
Anyone else have details on what these things mean? I'm just clicking around reading blog entries.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Users chose to do it to themselves. So presumably its just as legal as adblock
Can't see it being a good thing when Google are deciding what company to buy though - would anyone buy adblock? I absolutely hate plugins/companies that just routinely cover up other peoples advertising. It's not a smart move IMHO.
would anyone buy adblock?
Makes even more sense to buy and kill a service hurting you.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#38Rapportive is awesome because its simple and easy to understand. Everyone gets it without any confusion. Would be interesting to see how they make money, though. Thats a toughie, especially considering the target market is Gmail users.
Also, anyone know how they are getting Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Skype info for email addresses? Are they using RapLeaf? If so, are they paying for every such lookup? That would be a huge cost to deal with.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#39Rapportive looks cool but I wouldn't be surprised to see something similar or 'good enough' appear in Labs at some point. It reminds me of url shorteners on twitter.
Looking at the set of investors who endorsed their vision, I think they probably have a lot more to come which may define why its more interesting beyond the mashups they have right now.
Re: Rapportive (YC S10) Raises Over $1 Million From Gmail Creator & Others
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you get away with removing the ads from Gmail? is that not against their TOS?
We believe the context we provide is a much more valuable use of the limited sidebar space than the ads it replaces; and we think that adds value to the platform, both for Google and for its users. People evidently agree, as (nearly) nobody complains about the loss of the ads, but lots of people love the utility we provide - and indeed have switched to Gmail to get it. We're not interested in cheating Google out of t…
That didn't really answer the questions.