Internet moves in really fast pace. Last year or two I got impression that Blogger is not that important asset for Google as it should be. At same time people started using blogging platforms in unexpected ways, which made separation line between blogging and tweeting marginal.
Like early internet pioneers moved from Geocities to Blogger, it is time for me to say good bye to Blogger and move to Tumblr.
You can follow me on: hypesufer.com
Euthanizing Instaright
I want to start by thanking everyone for supporting Instaright over the 3 past year. I'm extremely proud with how the app turned out, but unfortunately reality has caught up with us.
Instaright was my first baby and it helped me a lot to understand product and customer development and how it feels like to bootstrap your company.
At first it looked like I've hit the sweet spot. Users loved Instaright! I've received a lots of praises. As soon as I introduced Donate button on Firefox addon, donations keep pouring in. Those where enough to keep app up and running for months. App was running purely on users donations, but as soon as Google Appengine changed pricing model price of hosting such product when sky high. I've considered various pricing models, but none turned out to be good enough to uniquely distinct Instaright from other services in market. On top of that, app was dying for redesign. Time was running out, but I had big plans for Instaright.
Grand vision for Instaright was to become implicit version IFTTT where links, based on user intentions, would be sent to various destinations with just one click and no predefined rules. Upcoming (never shipped) version of Instaright supported Evernote, Picplz, Twitter and Facebook (no Instapaper but Instaright). Ie, if user "Instarights" image - it will be send to PicPlz; if user "Instarights" selected text it will be sent to Evernote as note; or if user "Instarights" article, then based on trends and internal article-souce score, it will be shared on Twitter or Facebook (thus, leveling up your social present and social rating). I still believe that this kind of implicit sharing service is in need by wide range user cohorts, ranging from social media experts to busy office employees.
NOTE: Unpublished version of Instaright did not include support for Instapaper, since Marco Augment provided no feedback when asked for oAuth key despite dozen of request.
In the meantime, while struggling to keep Instaright up and running, I've received great job opportunity and was offered to move to Berlin. Which I have accepted and now I'm fully focused on new endeavour.
Still, I believe that idea behind Instaright can be monetized. If you have some thoughts on subject, I'd be more then happy to share more details with you - just PM me.
Thanks again for your support, and if you want to be notified when I announce my next app you can follow me on twitter.
Bojan Babic
Creator of Instaright
Instaright ReLoading
It has been very exciting couple of months since last blog post (release of Instaright Google Chrome extension ). A lot has been accomplished and still, many features need to be implemented. Ideas are just popping up and it is very hard to distinguish gems from sea of ideas. Basically, I try to stay lean, have clear mind and focus on most important issues and features.
Lets get onto lastest Instaright updates:
- First you'll notice that this blog is now sub domain of instaright.com instead of instaright.tumblr.com
- Twitter Instaright handle got almost 3K followers and has steady klout score round 50
- Front end got new sections: Categories and Domains
- Embedded information in stream( images, videos, pdfs, books etc) in order to provide more useful link snippet in steam
- Ajax support for crawlers (notoriously know as hash-bang), which resulted in big increase in number of indexed pages.
And many more ... If you are interested in what else is cooking, check out user dashboard in order to get sense of what else is cooking.
PS: Also there are many issues that Instaright face. The biggest one is rebranding of instaright.com and getting rid of Instapaper legacy icons ( sorry, Marco still haven't done it ). If you have some idea for new icon or have some manga-type minimalistic monster graphic at your disposal, I'll glad to consider it.
Instaright Social Bookmariking and Recommendation App
Sharks at HP
It all started by HP acquisition of Palm for $1.2b in April of 2010. All of online news ranted that WebOS is future of HP and that Apple finally got competitor. Behind the scene, whole acquisition was actually bailout for Elevation Partners on their $460m investment in Palm. Initially, Elevation Partners initially invested $325m including preferred stocks and liquidation preference. Afterwards, same VC firm, in successive investing rounds, Elevation Partners invested even more. Whole deal structure you can find here. Overall, Elevation Partners got $485m on $460m investment and earning $25m.
Couple of months later in August of 2010, Mark Hurd, HP CEO, steps down after to sex affair with ex softcore porn actress that has been working as his assistant. How in the world she got access to such high position at HP? Well ... on second thought this scenario can be seen very often, just take a look affair behind main man behind WikiLeaks - Julian Assange .
Successor of Mark Hurd, Leo Apotheker indulged himself into HP adventure on September 2010. Having in mind that Leo's previous position was CEO of SAP, company focused on consulting and support, and fact that Palm acquisition was not Leo's deal - Leo spins off HP's WebOS business. And this is how $1.2b just disappeared from HP.
What happened here? Obviously Mark Hurd has been closely monitored and there has been whole network of associates that have been reporting to board directly. My take on this is that Mark has been mislead into Palm deal and as soon as it has been closed, his services at HP where no longer needed. After advent of Leo Apotheker and one shot chance for WebOS, this division on HP business went into hibernation.
Maybe, I've made some wrong assumptions here because do not have enough insights on HP situation. Events that happen in last year and half round HP deserve deeper analysis. Sharks are hungry.
Bojan Babic
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