Andrew Chen is a startup and growth writer who covered social networks, viral marketing, ad monetization, and Web 2.0 startups.
HN commenters cite his posts as reference material on startup topics like ad monetization, interest versus intent, and how to meet people.
If its any consolation, Google announced plans to emulate a lot of the functionality planned for our new email client, Litepost, days after we started announcing and exploring our ideas with the public and users:
http://mail.google.com/support/bin/request.py?contact_type=suggest
I'm not saying they ripped us of course (who could possibly prove that?) but I will say that the timing is awfully coincidental, given that the overall ideas behind our program have been in development for almost a year (and we just started publicizing our ideas recently)!
Personally I take it as a compliment, and am grateful/flattered to have such a large competitor emulating plans we've had in development for a while. (The main thing we heard while pursuing this idea was "How can you possibly improve upon Gmail?" Well now Gmail itself recommends recommendations upon its service.)
All this, however, corresponds directly to what PG says and some of you echo below:
http://www.paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html 8. Slowness in Launching
(I'm new to this whole arena, so it's taken us a while to a) find the right developers and b) get up to speed before launch.)
If anyone's interested in weighing in, I wonder if open sourcing our project might help it or be of general interest/utility... is anyone interested in "an Open Source Alternative to Gmail that You Can Install and Run on Your Own Servers"? If so, I could use some help.
I am actually interested in ultimately duplicating _and open…
CPMs vary widely -- from $0.001 (yes that's 1/10 of a cent) to $40-60 for highly targeted verticals.
Educators don't have so much money to spend. It depends on how motivated and targeted your audience is, and how good of a sales team you have to leverage that audience (if you were thinking AdSense, think again. Unless your audience is mesothelioma educators). The only way to get a $10 CPM these days is with direct/premium sales.
Some reading:
http://www.mikeonads.com/
http://andrewchen.typepad.com/
http://clickz.com/experts/
http://ecpm.typepad.com/
andrew chen wrote a really good blog about interest vs. intent:
http://andrewchen.typepad.com/andrew_chens_blog/2007/09/why-your-social.html
It's true that a lot of LBS advertising models don't center around intent, but advertisers will still pay a premium for the additional context and relevance of reaching people near the potential point-of-sale. And what about LBS that employ Mobile Search?...
Great article.
I'd add a reference article:
http://andrewchen.typepad.com/andrew_chens_blog/2007/11/why-bloggers-an.html
In short, think hard about whether there are ways you can spend your time in a way the KEEPS GIVING you traffic/attention (SEO / viral). In the world of startups, if you are doing something it is invariably at the expense of something else.
That is why I can't stand California. Everybody is trying to "sit next to interesting people" looking for an opportunity to "break into circles". Quotes from here:
http://andrewchen.typepad.com/andrew_chens_blog/2007/02/how_to_meet_peo.html
I especially dislike this common "you must have a blog" bullshit.
Have you seen myspace.com? It's proof that clutter isn't the problem tech people think it is.
See http://andrewchen.typepad.com/andrew_chens_blog/2007/11/do-you-ever-say.html for more in depth coverage of the same idea.