
Guy Kawasaki on how he built Truemors for $12,107.09 - wird
http://www.slideshare.net/GKawasaki/how-i-built-a-web-20-usergenerated-content-citizen-journalism-longtail-social-media-site-for-1210709
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jsdalton
Not to be rude or anything, but what exactly is Truemors now? I guess it got
acquired, because when you visit the URL you get redirected here.

<http://truemors.nowpublic.com/>

A cursory review of the content shows a moderate number of submissions,
extremely light "interest" (e.g. the number one "greatest" truemor has 5
"interested" points -- maybe I don't understand what that means?) and almost
zero participation in the way of comments.

So some company overpaid him for what appears to be an extremely lackluster
product? Is there more to it than this? Because if not, this falls in the same
category of Ethan Hawke giving a presentation called "How I Got My Novel
Published and You Can Too" -- i.e. useless.

~~~
mattmaroon
It never had many customers. You could pretty much upload a picture of your
next bowel movement, create a login system, if you had the PR machine that is
Guy Kawasaki behind it, get at least 80% as many users as Truemors.

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redorb
The 2nd slide that dropped the line

"How I built a web 2.0, user generated content, citizen journalism, long-tail,
social media site for $12k"

made me want to vomit, all I see is How I Buzzword, buzzword, buzzword..

~~~
steveplace
Pretty sure he was lampooning that point.

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Jasber
I've always like reading Guy's material. He often has very thoughtful pieces
with plenty of actionable advice.

That being said I'm not impressed with either of his 2 most recent startups,
truemors.com and alltop.com.

I'm not sure if its the idea or the implementation--but neither jump out at me
as significant. I guess I expect more from Guy considering he's a world-known
VC/author/blogger.

~~~
feverishaaron
As much as I like Guy, I don't think Truemors or Alltop would have received as
much attention as they have if they were built/marketed by anyone that didn't
already have Guy's stature.

In other words, I wouldn't rely too heavily on these sites when considering
"best practices" scenarios.

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SingAlong
If you connect the bad facts, you'll find that they had to go thru a bad patch
too.

 _Site hacked in 3 hours of launch

Yahoo recommends not to use its hosting after 36 hours

Labeled 'the worst website ever' after 2 days_

~~~
petercooper
It happens. Remember Cuil?

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AndrewWarner
Why so many haters? We're entrepreneurs. Let's study what Guy did well and
learn from it. If he's willing to be open with his numbers, I want to learn as
much as I can from it, don't you? And if the big lesson is that building a
personal brand helps launch a site, let's do it.

~~~
1gor
Why? He increased noise.

Another meritless product wrapped in buzzwords competing for attention in the
space that others have created.

He has acted as an entrepreneurial spammer.

~~~
AndrewWarner
IMHO every entrepreneur who takes a shot should be praised.

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TheBosch
Does anyone know what he meant by "55 domains to 'surround' truemors.com" ?

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mynameishere
I could have built it for "only" nothing.

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jhancock
software dev - $4500, legal fees - $4824.

Even on a shoestring budget, the lawyers get half.

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sabat
Step 1: Be Guy Kawasaki

Step 2: Spend about $10,000 more than you need to because you're already
independently wealthy through non-startup means (read: AAPL)

Step 3: Get much more attention for your startup than most people would
because you're Guy Kawasaki

Step 4: Sell as soon as it's feasible

Step 5: Profit

~~~
frisco
What? That's not a legitimate PROFIT strategy. You missed a vital step.

~~~
sabat
You're right, I left out this:

Step 6: ???

Step 7: Profit! (Again)

~~~
frisco
yep. that's better.

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bhiggins
Guy got robbed

~~~
helveticaman
Yaw, $399 for a logo is insane. I'd have made it another of those things that
you skimp on to brag about.

