About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
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About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
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Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#2> “People shouldn’t leave it to Google to define who they are based on an algorithm,” Mr. Conrad said, adding that there is not one place that defines a person’s identity online.
I know this is just marketing speak, but it is still deliciously ironic...Isn't about.me's success dependent on Google rewarding it for its SEO friendly title,h1 tags and short links?
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#3It was curious when AOL bought About.me four days after About.me launched. 4 days. That's insanely fast. Tony Conrad must have friends at AOL.
What's curious is buying the company back. Maybe Conrad is returning a favor?
In the end, what About.me brings to the table is pretty boring. You want a personal site? There are 10,000 ways to do that. I don't see the value in it personally...and maybe AOL doesn't either, but the host of VC's lining up for About.me's $5.7 million financing round must.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#4Anyone interested what we had to say when it was purchased in the first place:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2025764
Still, bubble's been going a while now hasn't it! I think this was when a lot of people here started saying 'bubble!'. Me included. If it's a bubble, it's becoming a big old one.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#5> “People shouldn’t leave it to Google to define who they are based on an algorithm,” Mr. Conrad said, adding that there is not one place that defines a person’s identity online. I know this is just marketing speak, but it is still deliciously ironic...Isn't about.me's success dependent on Google rewarding it for its SEO friendly title,h1 tags and short links?
The statement isn't anti-Google or anti-SEO for businesses or individual websites. It's just pointing out that googling someone isn't useful if their online identity is spread over a bunch of websites.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#6It was curious when AOL bought About.me four days after About.me launched. 4 days. That's insanely fast. Tony Conrad must have friends at AOL. What's curious is buying the company back. Maybe Conrad is returning a favor? In the end, what About.me brings to the table is pretty boring. You want a personal site? There are 10,000 ways to do that. I don't see the value in it personally...and maybe AOL doesn't either, but…
Perhaps the VCs are investing in Conrad, not About.me as it exists today. I can't imagine a vanity site like About.me's current incarnation having a whole lot value; but perhaps it will get engineered into some sort of social aggregator or identity management service.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#7It was curious when AOL bought About.me four days after About.me launched. 4 days. That's insanely fast. Tony Conrad must have friends at AOL. What's curious is buying the company back. Maybe Conrad is returning a favor? In the end, what About.me brings to the table is pretty boring. You want a personal site? There are 10,000 ways to do that. I don't see the value in it personally...and maybe AOL doesn't either, but…
The concept was already "proven" by Flavors.me. About.me was a better domain name, and better marketed.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#8It was curious when AOL bought About.me four days after About.me launched. 4 days. That's insanely fast. Tony Conrad must have friends at AOL. What's curious is buying the company back. Maybe Conrad is returning a favor? In the end, what About.me brings to the table is pretty boring. You want a personal site? There are 10,000 ways to do that. I don't see the value in it personally...and maybe AOL doesn't either, but…
The concept was already "proven" by Flavors.me. About.me was a better domain name, and better marketed.
Flavors.me ended up being acquired by Moo.com though. I don't think they ever got "huge"
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#9I still respect Conrad for making the initial sale (supposedly) for the benefit of his team, who, unlike Conrad himself, hadn't experienced a startup exit yet.
Re: About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL
#10> “People shouldn’t leave it to Google to define who they are based on an algorithm,” Mr. Conrad said, adding that there is not one place that defines a person’s identity online. I know this is just marketing speak, but it is still deliciously ironic...Isn't about.me's success dependent on Google rewarding it for its SEO friendly title,h1 tags and short links?
The statement isn't anti-Google or anti-SEO for businesses or individual websites. It's just pointing out that googling someone isn't useful if their online identity is spread over a bunch of websites.
The business of reputation management is becoming more and more challenging for regular folk, business owners and professional services providers. Site like about.me give people the opportunity to list their official profiles and places where the comments should be considered to be the true word of the author. I can't tell you how many times I have found either twitter accounts or facebook pages that are not the "official" version for a person or company. I still like the concept of saying - these site are directly connected to .me