What if a little site you love doesn’t have a business model? Yell at the developers! Explain that you are tired of good projects folding and are willing to pay cash American dollar to prevent that from happening. It doesn’t take prohibitive per-user revenue to put a project in the black. It just requires a number greater than zero.Pinboard founder Maciej Ceglowski • Offering a rarely-heard take on the free-Web-app movement — that startups without business models are only hurting end-users, an argument that’s fresh in the minds of some after Gowalla’s staff got acquired by Facebook, but not its product. (This is a pain we know all too well, thanks to the pending death-by-acquisition of Apture and our scramble to replace it.) And in case you’re wondering, Ceglowski follows his own advice — he charges a one-time $9.55 fee to join his Delicious competitor. We’re with him (though we’re not opposed to the freemium idea that sites like Reddit use). We’ll gladly pay a $10 one-time fee to use a product if it means the product’s still going to exist in three years. source (via • follow)
While Facebook isn’t acquiring the Gowalla service or technology, we’re sure that the inspiration behind Gowalla will make its way into Facebook over time.A statement from Facebook • Basically emphasizing that they bought out Gowalla’s staff, not its service. It apparently was a marriage of mutual ambition: “It became clear that the way for our team to have the biggest impact was to work together,” said Gowalla CEO Josh Williams. The statements effectively play into what many have figured about the Gowalla team — they’re a very good company at design, but ultimately, their product was an also-ran in the market, one increasingly surpassed by Foursquare. They shouldn’t feel bad, though — Facebook was an also-ran at location-sharing, too. source (via • follow)
The sum? Undisclosed. In what’s probably Facebook’s highest-profile acquisition since it scooped up FriendFeed in 2009, the social network bought Gowalla, a popular location check-in service that’s probably the most notable competitor to market leader Foursquare. Facebook had a location check-in service of its own called Facebook Places, which it discontinued back in August after it flopped in the market. So, two questions: With Facebook’s backing, can Gowalla get a kick in the pants? Or is it dead entirely? (For what it’s worth: FriendFeed is still online, though it hasn’t been actively developed in years.) Either way, if you don’t want Facebook to have your Gowalla data, location check-in fans, check out TheNextWeb’s guide. source
Google Acquires Zagat To Flesh Out Local Reviews
Foursquare might want to start upping their ante right now. Gowalla…well…I don’t know what to say.
What an interesting choice by Google. A surprisingly low-tech choice. Yelp is the company that should worry most about this purchase.
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