If I were starting out now (in startup land), I would clone threewords.me

http://www.gabrielweinberg.com/blog/2011/02/if-i-were-starting-out-i-would-clone-threewordsme.html

by tchae • 15 years ago

59 32 15 years ago

jayzee• 15 years ago

Kinda huge assumption that you are going to go viral. Mark himself said in some earlier thread that he has been trying many things for many years and this was the one that took off.

Bottom-line is that you can predict what would go viral as much as you can predict what would be fashionable. Not that much.

epi0Bauqu8• 15 years ago

You don't have to predict. That's why you clone :)

abstractbill• 15 years ago

Some things seem like they're a one-shot though, e.g. the Million Dollar Home Page.

Alex3917• 15 years ago

The key to something going viral is its novelty. If something has already been done before then it's almost guaranteed not to go viral.

mixmax2• 15 years ago

Can you give one example of this? I can't seem to think of any. There's only one threewords.me, and there's only one chatroulette. The followers most likely won't go viral.

PakG1• 15 years ago

Normal people can't. Somehow the real visionaries can. Just saying. In technology, Steve Jobs would probably rank at the top.

bigiain2• 15 years ago

On the other hand, you can predict with 100% accuracy that any idea you _don't_ build _isn't_ going to go viral. (at least not for you...)

Jach• 15 years ago

Ahh the dangers of 100%... A notable exception: Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss ( http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2054297 )

zachallaun• 15 years ago

First, it's fun. I can't argue that that may be the case.

Second, you'll learn a ton by working with millions of users. This is predicated on the huge assumption that your viral platform attracts millions of users, and that a large number of these (assuming every new internet entrepreneur is doing one...) are sustainable.

Third, it will pay off. Mark's pay-off, I'm sure, was more than he initially envisioned. That amount, to my knowledge, however, remains undisclosed. I don't believe enough evidence exists to assure such a payoff and create such confidence.

Fourth, you can use the user base to launch another startup. Sure, 1% of ~10M users is cool. But that, again, rests on the assumption that you can build up that base of 10M users.

I realize that this formula may have worked, and that value could likely be created from cloning it. Cloning just may work. I can't shake off the feeling, though, that a bit of misinformation is being spread here.

[edit for clarification]: Of course, both the author's post and my response is solely opinion, which makes my use of the word misinformation, well, misinformation. What I mean to say is that I can't help but draw comparisons to "get rich quick" schemes, where opinion was packaged in such a way that people took it as fact.

StavrosK• 15 years ago

> Sure, 1% of ~10M users is cool. But that, again, rests on the assumption that you can build up that base of 10M users.

Also, he forgets that there are numbers less than 1%.

epi0Bauqu8• 15 years ago

1% wasn't chosen out of a hat. I see it in real (startup) life a lot.

MikeMakesIt• 15 years ago

1% of 10M users isn't cool. You know what's cool? 1% of a billion users :P

epi0Bauqu8• 15 years ago

"a bit of misinformation is being spread here"

It's my opinion on my personal blog, not fact. I hope that was clear.

markbao2• 15 years ago

Good idea. I'm on it.

epi0Bauqu8• 15 years ago

Are you for real?

guynamedloren• 15 years ago

I'm guessing you caught that sarcasm, but for anybody who is unaware - he's the one who made threewords.me

markbao2• 15 years ago

Hehe, nah. I want to try other viral experiments, though. That I'm actually on :)

Sapient• 15 years ago

Good to hear, but I am curious.

When threewords went viral, you were using a single linode, and seemed to solve your scaling problems by just upgrading to a larger node and implementing a bit of caching. What have you learned and what would you do differently this time?

tchae• 15 years ago

1) although you can hope for it, you can't guarantee something will become viral. threewords.me could have just as easily been another "project" had it been pushed out at the wrong time, sent to the wrong people, etc. etc. there's a lot of luck involved. i'm glad it took off the way it did. Mark made sure he would maximize the viral potential by having it easily shareable, etc, but that alone didn't make it viral.

2) i'm just jealous that he got real time experience in learning to scale his servers to support the crazy growth in users. not many people in the world have experienced viral growth with their webapps or startups. so congrats to Mark.

makeee• 15 years ago

Somewhat related question:

If a viral project takes off and a month later 95% of your traffic has died off, but you find yourself with 10 million email addresses (signups), is it ethical or even legal to promote a completely unrelated project by emailing everyone?

I'm sure you could word it in a way that doesn't seem too spammy ("Thanks for checking out xxxx, try our new project: yyyyy").

I'm in this situation.. I've held off so far, as tempting as it is, because I hate spam myself..

prawn• 15 years ago

Can you update your original project with something worth mailing people about, then include in its footer and in the footer of the mail-out, something along the lines of:

"The Makeee network includes OriginalProject.com and the all new NewProject.com (has to be seen to be believed!)."

Or:

"PS. If you've got time, please check out my latest project - I'd really appreciate your feedback."

Or, perhaps a little spammy, do a joint mail-out for two projects in one newsletter?

Joakal• 15 years ago

If you don't send regular emails, don't email them all yet. With 95% of the traffic dying down, scale back to minimise costs and work on new project until it's finished/ready.

When you get a new project ready; say something along the lines of "This will be the last email from viral-project.

The viral-project closing down, thanks for participating! (Allow option for people to get messages/pm/etc if it's a permanent shut down).

I will be focusing my efforts on a new direction: new-project."

vaksel• 15 years ago

it's fine to do that in my book...hell it's not like you are selling the email addresses like some people or spamming them with Amazon affiliate links.

mkramlich• 15 years ago

it's on now, baby: fourwords.me

(fivewords.me, sixwordsme.com.au, etc.)

derrida• 15 years ago

Cool, and then when the enumerable infinity of naturals is registered, let's go transcendental.

If I were starting out now (in startup land), I would clone threewords.me

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