Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Michael Tippett — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 14:21:06 -0000

Hi Pete, Thanks for the post about the site.

As far as the alexa data goes, it (like any single metric) should be taken with a grain of salt. But even with its flaws I don't think it's as easily gamed as people think. It was pretty easy to get an alexa pop in 2001 but these days installing the plug in on a single machine doesn't have much of an effect (unless I'm installing it wrong).

As far as tracking us against NewsVine, OhMyNews and Wikinews I think we fare pretty well given that we've built our site with pennies vs. dollars. Using websearch (the metric cited above) we do even better. We're ranked in the same order of magnitude and to date we haven't had the financial horsepower they've enjoyed.

Addressing the comment above about the lack of original content, I disagree. All the photographs and videos featured on the site come from people on the ground. Check out the raw footage stream and you'll see what I mean. While many of the stories are reblogged, the amount of user generated content as meaured by this is pretty much unrivalled in the news world.

Yours,

Michael Tippett,
NowPublic.com
mtippett (at) nowpublic (dot) com.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Mark Devlin — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 02:48:44 -0000

For sites similar to my own, I look at the number of posts, or user-generated pieces of content in a given time frame. I also look at the quality level of user activity, and whether there appears to be growth in the product and its userbase.

As I mentioned in my blog you could also use systems like Websearch.com, that give a wider view of the market than Alexa. There are also professional comparison tools (if you can afford them).

What I'm saying is that reliance on a single metric such as Alexa.com can lead to distortions in the perception of both individual companies, and the market in general.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Mike D. — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 00:32:54 -0000

I think there are a million ways to measure how well a site is doing. Traffic, buzz, general rate of improvement, registered users, site activity, etc etc etc. Even if you use the same metric, you can disagree on whether the result is "good" or "bad".

For instance, usage of YouTube has obviously exploded over the last few months. They are burning $1 million a month in bandwidth alone. Some would look at that and say "Wow, what a huge success! Keep spending and revenue will catch up eventually." This sentiment may or may not be true in the end. If it is, great... more power to YouTube for creating a great product.

I look at that, however, and see a company that is spending more every two weeks than we've spent *altogether* on Newsvine so far. Daily traffic trends aren't really of much interest to me (good or bad) until our feature set and content offerings are where I want them. As far as I'm concerned, we're still very much in "beta" to use other companies' definitions of beta (like Google's or Flickr's)... I just don't like wussing out and using the beta label. If you're released, you're released. But yes, things are good so far... :)

P.S. Nice URL for this post, Pete.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

David Berube — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 22:22:25 -0000

I don't think you really can. I guess you would have to rely on the statistics given to you by the companies.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Pete Cashmore — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:23:39 -0000

(Yeah, fixed the blockquote.)

So how do you propose we track the wider market?

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Mark Devlin — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:21:48 -0000

can you fix the closing blockquote tag? sorry.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Mark Devlin — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:20:58 -0000

However, even if we tracked â€œbuzzâ€ around Newsvine vs NowPublic, I think Newsvine would still come out on top.

Which begs the question: are you tracking "buzz", or are you tracking ability to perform? Both of those sites are performing well in buzz, but not so well in the wider market.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Pete Cashmore — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:16:49 -0000

Mark,

Yeah, I agree that Korea is the exception, rather than the rule. I don't think an OhMyNews clone built for the US market would enjoy the same success.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Mark Devlin — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:10:34 -0000

I suggest you avoid using Alexa as the basis of comparison of Web 2.0 start-ups. Please refer to my post on the Alexa popularity myth. In short, Alexa results are over-represented by tech users (and are easily gamed), therefore they did not give an accurate analysis of a start-up's position.

As for NowPublic's "change of strategy" -- a casual look at the site will show that there are hardly any views or comments on their "popular" stories. The site has much less than their claimed traffic levels.

How can NowPublic sell user-generated content when there is none? And how can they sell content to news providers when what little seed content they do have comes from the same news providers themselves?

BTW, OhMyNews worked in Korea because there was a huge gap in the market because national news was so restricted. The market in the U.S. is far more open and competitive.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

Pete Cashmore — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 21:01:58 -0000

David,

Yeah, I know. I've pointed out the unreliablility of those stats many times. However, even if we tracked "buzz" around Newsvine vs NowPublic, I think Newsvine would still come out on top.

Re: NowPublic Gets $1.4 Million

David Berube — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 20:44:23 -0000

Please, stop using Alexa as a means to verify traffic. It is not accurate, not really even close to being accurate. Ask any traffic expert and they'll tell you the same.

I could make an impact on my sites rankings if I had an Alexa toolbar installed. It would be a noticable impact as well. So please stop using it....