

Ark (YC W12) raises big seed round - priley
http://allthingsd.com/20120425/people-search-engine-ark-raises-biggest-y-combinator-seed-round-ever/

======
derwiki
Anyone know why they pivoted? As of last summer, they were doing Cause related
stuff (like we do at Causes.com). It was a little weird -- I saw a few
cartoons on their site of a cute penguin (their logo) standing triumphantly
over a dead polar bear (with the Causes logo). They also became the Mayor of
our office on 4sq. So.. seeing that they're doing people search right now is a
bit of a departure.

~~~
kloncks
Seems they still have this Cause related stuff, accessible via link in footer.

<http://ark.com/fund/>

~~~
priley
We were just messing with you guys (Causes). ;) You can have your 4sq
mayorship back. We initially were trying to enable people to connect based on
similar charity interests. It's still available and people still use it. We
just broadened the focus.

------
dmbaggett
_Part of what’s hard about social search is that Facebook prohibits outside
crawlers. But Riley said he’s confident that he can get Facebook data, because
he has gotten advice from Facebook CTO Bret Taylor, and has worked with
Facebook’s legal team to make sure everything’s kosher._

This would seem to be a key point. Can anyone provide further details?
Facebook hasn't historically shown much inclination to let others into the
walled garden: [http://petewarden.typepad.com/searchbrowser/2010/04/how-i-
go...](http://petewarden.typepad.com/searchbrowser/2010/04/how-i-got-sued-by-
facebook.html)

Why would Facebook allow this?

~~~
ianedwards
Because they're not using a crawler, that's why. Or, at least, that's my sense
of things.

~~~
dmbaggett
Wait, so now anyone who wants to index Facebook can, as long as they don't
crawl? Obviously, that's not true. So what's the deal? Does Facebook now have
warrants in ark.com or something? There must be some quid pro quo.

~~~
compsciphd
they are probably using the graph api. Which doesn't give you access to much
data for most people (As we're all trained to limit what other people's apps
can see of us)

~~~
priley
Absolutely correct. We are using the Graph API. The magic comes with you do
link analysis and cluster it with other public data.

------
2pasc
Congratulations to them! It's impressive, and the product seems really
interesting.

But having 9 VC invested in your Company is really not an idea situation. (cf:
[http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/04/vc-signaling-coming-home-
to-...](http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/04/vc-signaling-coming-home-to-
roost.html))

I am wondering why they did not want to/could not raise money from one VC only
who would have lead the round (with say $3M) with super angels and individuals
completing the round. That would have made their Company so much more
manageable at the board level...

~~~
ianedwards
The other negative signal is all their talk of doing "massive" things. Did fb
ever talk this way? Not to my knowledge ... they just DID things. Lot's of
hype / cockiness on this one.

~~~
2pasc
Totally agree. Everybody forgets that neither Facebook, nor Google, eBay,
LinkedIn, Youtube, were saying they were doing massive things. And yet...

~~~
priley
Why do you guys think that? I received this email in 2004 from TheFacebook.com
founders encouraging me to join their team.

" \- Thefacebook.com is one of the hottest new websites.

\- Our numbers are some of the best on the Internet: 1.5-2 billion page views
per month, 2.3 million registered users, and 60%+ of the user base comes back
_every day_

"

If you are starting your own company, you should be 120% sure you are building
something huge that people want. It's also much harder now to attract
engineers then it was back then, which is essentially the main reason you even
talk about a round.

~~~
2pasc
Thanks for participating in the discussion. I completely understand what you
are talking about regarding attracting engineers. It's so crazy currently in
Silicon Valley!

I am not saying that you should not be ambitious. It's just that I see so many
people boasting huge vision with no traction at all. As you can see in the
email above, TheFacebook was indeed a hot website with amazing traction. Their
ambition (social graph, platform, etc...) came later, and so many times
entrepreneurs think that they need to have the big vision first when their MVP
is not used at all.

In the case of Ark, I believe that you have a very interesting product, and
that being where you are right now is a very interesting position. I wish you
all the success in the world to bring that to fruition and be able to get the
traction you need to go to the next level. Good luck! I would love to have
coffee with you and hear more about it if you are in the city!

------
34code
Ark is "already" doing massive things for sure. It already has indexed 1
billion+ profiles and more coming in the pipeline. I do not know of any other
search engine that has accomplished that yet

~~~
priley
Thanks! But we feel like we are only 1% done. Our team has confidence in what
we can accomplish... now it's just a matter of execution and having smart
hackers on the team.

------
sytelus
Does anyone has invites to check out Ark?

