While surfing the web I stumbled upon a very curious story that, despite its peculiarities, or perhaps because of them, has a lot to teach us about startuppers.
We must go back to the late 90s, when Stanford Magazine published an article by one of its former students, Robert L. Strauss, who in the eighties, in defiance of his MBA in General Management and MA in International Economics, saw the birth, and shortly after the death, of what he considered to be the idea of the century.
The Segway story is incredible.
It is the year 2001, when the worldwide media is beginning to spread rumours of the arrival of something extraordinary and unique, possibly even revolutionary.
Insiders are talking about a pioneering transportation system that they call IT or Ginger.
“We launched Google Reader in 2005 with the aim of making it easier for users to find and retain their favourite websites. Although the product enjoyed a loyal audience, over the years its use has declined. That is why, on July 1st, 2013, we will be withdrawing Google Reader”- Google, March 2013.
There are two schools of thought about Google’s decision to abandon the old RSS aggregator, which has never been as successful as anticipated: The first is that this is the absolute worst thing that has ever happened on the Internet. And the second is: Who cares?
It wasn’t long ago that we heard the news about the closure of Wantful: the American startup created in 2011 by designer and entrepreneur John Poisson, which proposed the ambitious goal of revolutionizing the world of e -commerce and gifting.
But what exactly ended his run is still unknown to most people.
Thanks to an innovative navigation system, the company based in San Francisco and New York could advise their web surfers about what would be the most appropriate gift, analyzing information, the gender, tastes and preferences, of those who would receive them.
Facebook will fail within three years.
Foreword: I already know that this article will be the basis of strong discussion. I know that, but I am still convinced of what I just wrote.
Because if the world’s most popular social network does not drastically change, in three years, five max, it will no longer exist or at least it will no longer exist as we know it now.
Looking at it, it seems like a simple toy, a toy dinosaur.
Well, it definitely is a toy. But why are we talking about it in this blog?
In reality Pleo is a robot designed and engineered to mimic the movements and appearance of a baby Camarasaurus of a week old (bear in mind, of just a week!). It was created by Caled Chung, the co-founder of Furby, cute little soft toys that move and do a thousand things (the modern version can also be managed through smartphones).
The story could be told in the 308 and 1970 followers, the last of which was more than 13 months ago.
AT Shaker, the app that enabled you to live directly through your Facebook profile, within rooms/virtual zones, has disappeared into thin air. Have you seen it anywhere?
If, in a previous article, we talked about the end of a brilliant startup due to a lack of passion, this time we shift the focus to a case that is diametrically opposed. The example of Everpix, in fact, is full of passion.
This startup, founded in San Francisco in 2011, will definitively disappear from the web on December 15th, 2013. And this is all despite the enormous efforts made by Pierre -Oliver Latour, its creator, to keep it alive. Yes, because once the abundant initial sum of nearly $2 million paid by the investors (including Index Ventures and 500 Startups) was gone, to avoid collapse Latour tried the only two solutions that were possible: find other financing or sell. And he tried. And tried again. And tried again and again. But his efforts, unfortunately, did not bear fruit, so… bye-bye Everpix!
Who doesn’t know Airbnb, the famous portal that allows anyone to “sell”, for one or more nights, their personal home in exchange for a fee?
Born in 2008 in San Francisco , by the intuitive genius of Nathan Blecharczyk , Brian Chesky (now CEO of the company ) and Joe Gebbia , Airbnb is essentially an online bazaar of rooms, apartments, villas, castles: a virtual storefront with strong social components that in a few years has literally revolutionized the way we travel. Not for nothing is it now considered the main competitor to sites such as Booking and Trivago, which sell “traditional” hotel rooms.
Catch Notes, the popular competitor of the Evernote app, designed and created to take notes, has permanently closed its doors on August 30th, 2013.
To say that the sudden disappearance of this app has amazed fans is very little. The news of its closure, in fact, blew a huge and general “What the hell!”
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