
I Have 50 Dollars - thehodge
http://ihave50dollars.com/
======
mootothemax
Commenters seem to be missing the point of this. Go visit the signup page, and
right at the bottom you'll see this tagline:

 _If you can spare $50 for a social network I'm guessing you can spare $50 to
help put an end to slavery. Yeah, it's 2012 and it's still a pretty big
problem. That shit is unacceptable. Really. </whiteguilt>_

Personally, I'm not the fan of the "don't spend money on anything until the
world's problems have been cured" style of thinking, but it's certainly a
novel idea.

Now all they have to do is fix the title of the signup page. Right now it says
_Signup For App.net_.

EDIT: Interestingly, the domain name of freetheslaves.net belongs to
"Superhuman Ventures, LLC." I don't know enough about how people taking
donations work, but I find it pretty strange that Free The Slaves have a long
list of directors and staff
(<https://www.freetheslaves.net/SSLPage.aspx?pid=285>) but no mention of what
their corporate structure is. Is this unusual? Should they explicitly be a
charitable organisation?

~~~
eric-hu
Their board and staff consist of 27 people, including all directors. The
breakdown of their expenditures structure is on the right sidebar of the
donation page:

5% Fundraising

11% Administration

84% Programs and Services

At the bottom of the same sidebar are links to their past financial documents,
up to 2010 ( <http://www.freetheslaves.net/Document.Doc?id=251> ). In that are
their compensations per-employee on page 7 and 8. Of the 12 employees listed,
no one received compensation of more than $36,000, and the total compensation
for all of them was less than $80,000. Most received zero compensation. The
average hours each work per week are also listed, so one can take an educated
guess about the corporate structure.

Their total revenue (~$2.9 mil) and expenditure (~$3.1 mil) are listed on page
12. For that year, they operated at a ~$200k loss, leaving them with ~$1.1 mil
in assets at the end of the fiscal year. More itemized details are available
within.

I think it's good to be skeptical of charitable organizations given the
corruption that has been exposed in some non profits. As to why 2010 is the
last available? The 2011 returns were due in April 2012. Perhaps they're
waiting on approval from the IRS before publishing it. Someone else could
chime in here with a better reason.

As for the "don't spend money on <x> until <y> is resolved" mentality...I see
it all the time:

"It's such a shame that people spend money on Instagram/Facebook/Twitter when
space travel/clean energy/cancer research/etc is such a greater cause..."

The communist anti-capitalism rhetoric of the mid 1900s was similar: comparing
the luxuries of the rich against the suffering of the lowest common
denominator. Perhaps there was a similar pitch on the capitalist side against
communism--I just don't see it.

I think the beauty of this organization (and most non-profits) is that it's
based on voluntary participation. They're not forcing anyone to donate. Their
emotional manipulation is on par with the typical commercial for weight loss,
beer, cologne, anti-depressant medication, etc...and in my opinion, their
cause is more noble.

~~~
calinet6
> The communist anti-capitalism rhetoric

Black and white much? This idea that everything that's anti-capitalist or
anti-stupid-ways-we-spend-money is _communist_ is absurd.

The anti-capitalism rhetoric of the "mid-1900's" was a full-on propaganda
campaign put out by government agencies and supported by the very real threat
of nuclear total annihilation. Comparing a complaint about the stupid ways we
spend money and organize our priorities to the Cold War is a _bit of a
stretch._ I fear communist comparisons are becoming the new Godwin's law.

In reality, the guilt mentality discussed above is much more similar to the
ultra-realist perspective of the comedy of Louis CK—
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk> —in that it is ridiculous that we
have the immediate concerns that we do, but is, in fact, entirely true, and
it's observant and useful to point that out.

It is not, however, _communist._

~~~
1point618
So, in the mid-1900's there was this thing called Communism. It was a real
thing, practiced in many different countries self-consciously. One of the
tenants of Communism as it was practiced was that capitalism was bad, and one
of the things that Communist countries did was to release anti-capitalist
propaganda. So when today we talk about communist anti-capitalist rhetoric,
we're not calling all anti-capitalist rhetoric communist, but rather referring
to that particular subset of anti-capitalist rhetoric which was, indeed,
communist.

This does not mean that such arguments are not straw manning the issue.
However, it does mean that they're more nuanced than whatever the argument is
that you're trying to debate with above.

~~~
NSMeta
Excuse me for a one-off useless comment, but a Communist country never
existed. USSR was not communist.

Communism is being described as "A communist society would have no
governments, countries, or class divisions."[1] Hence, no rulers. Communism in
its essence is a form of Anarchist society.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism#Etymology_and_termino...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism#Etymology_and_terminology)

~~~
chwahoo
For most idealistic -isms, I doubt any implementation could exist that would
satisfy the -ism's true believers (particularly since those implementations
would have flaws that would need to be disclaimed).

------
ctdonath
OH, NOW I GET IT.

Good night that was painful.

ihave50dollars.com is a spoof of join.app.net (duplicate layout of main page,
text changed), which is a no-ad paid-membership version of Twitter, which
apparently got VC funding to some people's amazement. An attempt to sign up
takes you to an "end slavery" charity.

Yeah, sounds stupid to spell it out like this. Not everyone knows what app.net
is, nor what its backstory is (I still don't). Ergo the spoof garners a well-
deserved WTF.

WHY someone felt compelled to create the spoof is still a mystery to some of
us.

~~~
vineet
I think the spoof was created was because (a) app.net has no value proposition
other than wanting $50, and (b) that there were over 100K people out there who
put in money regardless.

(No value proposition is more accurately no value proposition for the site by
itself. It does have a value proposition if it does billions of users like
twitter, but that there is no realistic way of getting there.)

~~~
ctdonath
"A thing is worth only and exactly what others are willing to pay for it."
Obviously it's worth $50 to 100,000 people. Some of us would like an ad-free
version of Twitter that, by paid signup, screens out much of the...um...less
interesting participants. Sounds like they've got 100,000 users already, which
seems a good start.

~~~
CodeMage
I've always thought that was a very shallow definition and this has just
helped me finally realize _why_ I think that.

Basically, I could announce that I'm offering a service whereby you give me
$50 dollars and I call you gullible. If I find 100,000 people willing to do
that, it would mean that my service is "worth" $5,000,000 dollars.

The "worth" you're talking about does not seem to me as a very good indicator
of whether we're improving the world or not.

~~~
ctdonath
Obtuse straw-man hypotheticals do not make for convincing argument. To the
contrary, the fact that you _can't_ find anyone to pay you $50 to call them
gullible shows that "service" _isn't_ worth $5M. Unless, of course, you
consider politicians...

If you're not involved in the transaction, you're not in a position to decide
"whether we're improving the world or not". Millions daily spend ~$50 for an
extravagant meal, far beyond nutritional needs, and having nothing but
excrement to show for it. Would you discount those goods/services as "not
improving the world" and not worth millions of dollars?

~~~
yen223
Codemage's comment neatly explains Facebook's current predicament though. All
of us suck at valuation it seems.

~~~
ctdonath
Clarification: we suck at predicting what something's value to others will be.

------
gexla
I'm going to be the first developer to build an app on the ihave50dollars API.
It's going to be a dating app, because what chick wants to hook up with a guy
who doesn't even have $50?

~~~
pavel_lishin
"We're going to Taco Bell for our first date, I spent my dining budget on a
social app."

------
gexla
I spent my last $50 to join ihave50dollars.com. I no longer have $50. I hope
nobody finds out, it will ruin my reputation within the network.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
Don't worry. After login you'll be automatically redirected to
ihad50dollars.com .

------
brianwillis
>First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you
win.

It would appear that App.net is now at stage two.

~~~
Kiro
And they will never get past that. I wouldn't mind it being stuck in stage one
though. All the App.net spam has seriously degraded the HN quality overnight.

~~~
dasil003
Oh come on, it's not that bad. There's never more than a few articles at once,
and it's a legitimate hacker topic since anyone would have to be a fool to
build on Twitter these days, and yet it is a very ripe API that people _want_
to build on.

~~~
uncoder0
I think you are right. People want to build on App.net. The problem is ~10,000
people have signed up and there are already ~100 apps for app.net[1]. To me
that sounds like a developer circle-jerk. Developers and other technophiles
typically have disposable income, love to bash incumbents and jump on the next
bandwagon. App.net satisfies all of those desires. It will be interested to
see if anyone else really cares.

I just don't think trading one man's walled garden for another is what we
need. We need an email-like solution to this problem. Something open and
federated.

[1][https://github.com/appdotnet/api-spec/wiki/Directory-of-
thir...](https://github.com/appdotnet/api-spec/wiki/Directory-of-third-party-
devs-and-apps)

------
redthrowaway
Alright, I read the damned post and I still have no idea what it's about. Is
it supposed to be satire, or some other wink and nod approach to...something?

Either I'm just not all that bright, or they took a swing and missed on their
message.

~~~
unimpressive
<https://join.app.net/>

It's making fun of the idea of paying $50 to sign up for a years membership to
this service.

------
ballooney

      Our team has spent the last 9 years building social
      synergy, developing paradigms, talking on out mobile
      phones and more.
    

Jesus wept.

Edit 30s later: Oh it's a spoof. My faith in humanity restored.

------
neebz
I am not really interested in all the twitter/app.net hoo-haa but I find it
intriguing that we are at a stage that one guy develops a product and charges
$50 for it. And the rest of the world mocks him for not making it free.

~~~
sofuture
People are not mocking app.net for not being free. They are mocking it for
being a generally silly idea borne of nerd-rage against 'the man' err...
Twitter... wait, what?

~~~
neebz
Yes they are.

They are mocking it because they think it's a privileged network only for
people who are willing to pay the grand sum of 50 US Dollars. It was the same
story with svbtle. This smug sense of entitlement is frankly disgusting.

~~~
foxhop
I used to follow Dustin Curtis. I liked that each of his blog posts had a
unique theme/layout/typography/imagery.

Then once he became popular what does he do? He built svbtle, a blog network
of bloggers who all have pages and posts that look identical...

I also avoid the greater-than-thou grouping.

------
notlisted
Where Dalton is going I don't know (and I feel he's generally a pompous ass
when he speaks/writes) but... I think app.net is a matter of OWNERSHIP.
Ownership of your data and ownership of the company.

Companies are beholden to those who pay. If it's the users who pay, the power
is with them. I like that idea. If it's the advertisers, they don't need to
care as much about the user, see FB and Twitter.

Stuff DOESN'T have to be free. I pay for many things, and in general the
things I pay for are better than things which are free.

I have no problems with the $50 or the request for it. Those who do should buy
GIMP, while I use Photoshop.

------
4ngle
If that's the cost of friendship, consider it paid.

All joking aside, I agree with the message. I almost signed up for app.net
today, but didn't (after _finally_ noticing the charge aspect (not gonna lie,
didn't really look into it)) because it is NOT going to overthrow anything,
let alone Twitter.

The warm sentiments of no ads is nice, but end-users don't give a shit. $50 is
MONEY, free--adversely--isn't.

I'll be happy if people can prosper from app.net, but I don't see much
happening there that didn't happen at google+.

~~~
malsme
I would never pay for something like that, I barely see a use for ad-supported
social networks, but those that pay will feel a psychological pressure to make
use of their investment, it will also create a feeling of privilege; whereas
something like Google+ is seen as free, open and less valued, and therefore
needs to vie for the attention.

~~~
slig
We whine and bitch about not having control of our data, about some corp
having central authority over everything and yet we decide to ignore
status.net and pay $50/year to something that doesn't even exist yet. Go
figure.

~~~
coldpie
It's almost as if there is more than one person involved in these actions!

------
Rulero
This is quite funny, it made me chuckle.

Now, putting the joke aside, let's be real. Whilst the majority of you aren't
willing to spend $50 (Including myself), the fact is, some people already have
and they have managed to raise a lot of money.

I suppose it doesn't matter what product you have as long as you know how to
market it and most importantly, solve a problem.

Whilst App.net may be ideal for developers because it considers their
requirements, I highly doubt whether main stream users care the problems that
App.net is trying to solve. None of my friends would pay for a social network,
and neither would I. Why? Because I can use my phone and there's plenty of
other free alternatives.

Either way, I wish App.net all the best but I rather keep my $50.

~~~
thinkingisfun
_I suppose it doesn't matter what product you have as long as you know how to
market it and most importantly, solve a problem._

What problem does app.net solve? Honest question, because it surely doesn't
solve the problem of walled gardens.

~~~
fusiongyro
They have a product they're charging $50 for and they have 1000 customers.
Whether _you_ see a problem being solved or not, there's clearly $50 of value
in the eyes of these 1000 people, and that's what a business is.

People can pay $25 to adopt a star, which is just a certificate saying you
spent $25 on a certificate. That's a legitimate business (or charity) even
though it's idiotic. Lots of businesses are about solving the problem of too
much thickness in your wallet and your head.

~~~
thinkingisfun
I know... like televangelists.. I was merely wondering if there is more to it.

I mean, people DO (intend to) develop apps for it.. how many of _them_ are
solving actual problems, and how many just make them in the hope that people
will use them? You know, the latter would kinda make app.net meta-kool-aid for
kool-aid brewers, but that's snarky, and also premature. So I'm really,
honestly asking, and willing to consider answers.

Yes, I am skeptical, but I'm trying to not be too much of a bigot. After all,
asking doesn't cost anything :D

~~~
fusiongyro
Asking is free, but what you ask frames the debate, and the truth is that
Twitter would have had no hope of satisfying you if you'd scrutinized it like
this. It's convenient that App.net is so clearly positioned as for-pay Twitter
because trying to explain what Twitter is or why you'd pay for it is
impossible if people don't already see the value in what Twitter does. What
actual problems does it solve? Now that we have App.net in the debate,
everyone can point to "network effects" as if that's the whole story but
that's certainly not why Twitter was created or what got the early adopters
interested.

World-changing apps solving actual problems? It's been two months, man! For
how long was the web nothing but "Welcome to my home page! It's under
construction!" with blinking text and animated GIFs?

~~~
thinkingisfun
What? The poster I replied to said

 _I suppose it doesn't matter what product you have as long as you know how to
market it and most importantly, solve a problem._

So I asked, what problem does it solve. That's all. Since you're not even the
one who claimed it solves a problem, why not, you know, let me ask that
question in peace, instead of moaning about me asking it?

~~~
fusiongyro
Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were having a private debate.

~~~
thinkingisfun
I was asking those who think app.net solves a problem which problem it solves;
that includes at least the person who seemed to imply (I'm not sure if they
did) it does, as well as anyone else. And it may even include you; feel free
to give it a shot. Just not interested in reasons for not answering it - lack
of responses does the same in less bytesize.

~~~
fusiongyro
Twitter keeps piling up requirements on developers using their API to maintain
their brand identity. App.net is going to allow developers to do whatever they
want. So it's everything technical you can do with Twitter, plus everything
they shut you down for doing.

~~~
thinkingisfun
I see we're going in circles, considering

 _it's convenient that App.net is so clearly positioned as for-pay Twitter
because trying to explain what Twitter is or why you'd pay for it is
impossible if people don't already see the value in what Twitter does._

~~~
fusiongyro
Yep.

------
tudorizer
Did anybody notice the background behind this? <https://heello.com/live>, from
the founder of Twitpic, which actually has a very close goal as App.net.

~~~
rrbrambley
I just noticed this. Um. Sad. Really sad.

~~~
tudorizer
Why sad?

------
hnruss
If you can't tell that a site called iHave50dollars.com is a joke... there is
a good chance you are confused about a lot of things. It might be time to
questions your assumptions about life.

------
amalag
Am I not hip enough, I don't understand the point to this.

~~~
briandear
I must not be hip either because I don't understand the point of App.net.

~~~
debacle
It's a twitter you pay for where none of the people you follow are on it.

What's not to get?

------
seagreen
Voluntary charity can of course be a noble and merciful thing.

That said, strike at the fucking root people.[1] The problem isn't slavery.
Slavery is a symptom of the problem. The problem is bad economies, which come
from bad government. If you're not working on trying to find ways to encourage
good government you're a hobbyists, not professionals, and you should take
claims like "Our goal: to end slavery in our lifetime."[2] off your website.

If you are interested in improving bad governments then for God's sake don't
listen to intellectuals. Read the people who've actually done it.[3] It's not
as good as a controlled experiment, but it's way better than pure talk.

[1] I'm actually not sure about 1st world countries like the U.K. There might
not actually be a root to strike at there.

[2] <https://www.freetheslaves.net/SSLPage.aspx?pid=285>

[3] [http://www.amazon.com/Singapore-development-policies-and-
tre...](http://www.amazon.com/Singapore-development-policies-and-
trends/dp/0195825152)

------
rickdale
I am offering a 6month same as cash interest free loan for those lacking the
$50. Check my profile for more details...

------
facorreia
I'm kind of disappointed. None of the comments so far have pointed out the
fundamental logic flaw in this.

Buying the membership doesn't prove you HAVE 50 dollars, it proves you HAD it.

------
debacle
I couldn't initially determine the level of seriousness of this page.

I spend too much time on HN.

------
georgespencer
"There are people [VERB] in [COUNTRY]" has never been a satisfactory argument
to me, and this seems to just be the digital version of that.

~~~
pessimizer
"Are" is the verb. I didn't understand what you wrote because of that until
after a few passes.

Try [GERUND] or better, [VERBing], maybe?

~~~
corin_
A gerund is just a form of verb, it doesn't prevent it from also being a verb.

~~~
jwoah12
It is a form of a verb, but it essentially becomes a noun. Which brings me to
my next point- [VERBing] is a participle in this case, not a gerund, since
it's an adjective modifying "people."

~~~
corin_
It doesn't become an adjective, it very much remains a verb. If it is, for
example, "people dying" then it's not saying "they are dying people", it is
saying that the people are currently dying, i.e. an action, using a verb.

~~~
pessimizer
"People are dying" Doesn't make dying a verb any more than "people are fish"
makes fish a verb.

>it is saying that the people _are_ currently dying

------
tzaman
Where can I sign up if I don't have 50 dollars?

~~~
smacktoward
IWishIHad50Dollars.com

------
akldfgj
The punchline is to show you a video about ending slavery along with a comment
about how spending money on that is more worthwhile than a social network.

The video was created at TEDx in Maui. TED is one of the most expensive social
networks in the world, charging thousands of dollars to attend the main
conference, which is the foundation of the TEDx programs.

Accidental endorsement of Dalton?

------
dumbluck
When you give, your intent is not to pay for a bunch of mailers to be sent
out, killing trees and increasing the world's CO2, and your intent is not to
hire some Ivy+ grad with a major in making themselves feel better about
helping people as they sit at their desk and drink their Starbucks mocha. You
want to free slaves, feed the homeless, feed the starving children, cure
cancer. Don't give to those that waste that generosity, and don't support
sites that don't tell you where your money is really going.

In this case, supposedly the overhead is 16%. That isn't great, but it is in
the "meh" category for me. I'd rather give to the Salvation Army that only
takes ~5% overhead. In addition, I'd like to see what the 86% going to
programs and services is really accomplishing.

------
rnernento
Nice start, clean design but it looks like signup is broken. It redirects to
some random TED talk :p

------
OzzyB
This is for a Charity? Well they botched that then IMO.

After clicking the top "alpha.ihave50dollars.com" link (and others) you end up
at heello.com. So I then understandably thought the site was a "snark-attack"
by the Heello/Twitpic guys.

After all, Heello was started by Twitpic when Twitter was just starting to
clamp down on their API usage and was about to start their own photo service
-- so Heello was started pretty much in the same spirit as App.net was -- at
least in the sense of "Hey! I'm pissed at Twitter, so now I'm gonna make a
competitor clone".

So I wonder, why doesn't anyone mention this Heello? Does the App.net guy have
more Hacker Mojo than the Twitpic guy? Is this Heello guy pissed that App.net
got paid $700k+ for doing what they wanted to do 1-2 years ago?

Hmmmm...

~~~
stevencorona
This was not made by Heello / Twitpic & has no affiliation with it.

------
akurilin
More free publicity for Dalton, he's not going to mind.

~~~
thinkingisfun
So? Good for him. In the big scheme of things, money is the consolation price.
This however is a spoof, it hits bullseye, and it's actually intelligent. You
cannot buy that with money.

How many posts have you seen on HN in the last days that mentioned "I put my
money where my mouth is"? I came across 3 or 4, one poster even quoted their
app.net welcome e-mail, haha...

Now this. Priceless. I couldn't stop laughing reading the page, and the fact
that they actually refer you to a worthy cause when you try to sign up makes
it all the better. 10 million out of 10 possible points for style, to quote
Douglas Adams.

~~~
arkitaip
It actually comes of as teen angsty and narrow minded. The type of nonsense
ignorant people like to spew because they can't grasp that we can focus our
collective effort on many things at the same time, that we can spend money on
our own interests and still be a positive force in the world.

~~~
thinkingisfun
> "It actually comes of as teen angsty and narrow minded."

The site? Or some of the reactions to it?

> "The type of nonsense ignorant people like to spew because they can't grasp
> that we can focus our collective effort on many things at the same time,
> that we can spend money on our own interests and still be a positive force
> in the world."

LOL? Now you're really _reaching_ for it.

------
state
With all the handwaving and yelling around this issue I find this really
refreshing.

------
pandeiro
This is fucking excellent satire. Hilarious.

------
paduc
I think this parody is right on. The app.net pitch is all about the fact there
is a fee. Why not build a cool app, ask for a fee and _then_ explain the
reason for the fee?

~~~
dasil003
Because it's not an app, it's a platform, and for a social platform to be cool
it needs to have critical mass.

~~~
briandear
A critical mass of people with $50.

------
kmfrk
This is like falling into a worm hole that takes you back to when Twitter was
competing with Pownce and Jaiku for marketshare.

What a bizarre situation.

------
ebabchick
finally, some truth shed on this developer-centric bubble of a "company"

------
niels_olson
From ebay:

> The seller will only ship to confirmed addresses. To complete this
> transaction, you will need to enter your information again.

by my address is confirmed. What gives?

------
lololz
I only have 49.99 :(

~~~
paul-woolcock
You should make ialmosthave50dollars.com

------
shredder
I have 50 dollars is a great satire of yet another social network (app.net)
that promotes non-social interaction..

------
maxer
is this the new reddit?

------
ilaksh
I think I'll go for a higher-end market, so I'm launching ihad5000dollars.com
tomorrow.

------
D9u
I don't have $50. I don't use twitter. I won't even login to Facebook anymore.

Thus I lol'd at this.

------
guscost
I would pledge to support this fine and fantastic platform!!!

------
namidark
The video on the main page is just a link to the sign up...

------
ruggeri
So, so good. You earned your $50.

------
zachinglis
This is beautiful.

------
madmikey
why not 50dollarsbacon.com

~~~
pandeiro
i don't get the reference but the domain is a winner for sure.

------
scottilee
Hilarious.

Yes, you're supposed to laugh.

------
ThePherocity
Actually, this really pisses me off. Heaven forbid that all the hard work we
do as developers actually come with a reasonable compensation option... like
money. I think more sites need to go pay only, I'm tired of every advertising
company on the internet knowing more about my buying preferences than I do.
Support developers FFS.

~~~
davidw
The reason social networks are not for pay is because of "network effects":

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect>

It's hard enough to get a network going, let alone make people pay for it.

~~~
jopt
I don't follow this reasoning. Social networks do tend to rely on network
effects, but must they?

It sounds cyclic. Social networks need lots of users because they can't charge
their users directly, and they can't charge their users directly because they
need so many users.

I don't know that app.net has to replace Twitter for everyone. Can't they be
smaller and yet successful, precisely because they charge users directly?

~~~
dllthomas
No, social networks need lots of users because their value is related to the
number of connections. If I don't know very many people on a social network,
it isn't very valuable to me.

Therefor, to offer the most value to users, those building social networks
want to get rid of barriers (including payment) that might prevent more people
from signing up. That, then, gets _reinforced_ by the cyclic relationship
between the fact that indirectly monetizing users tends to pull in relatively
little per user while marginal costs of hosting an additional user are minimal
- but the initial dynamic is an artifact of the nature of social sites to
begin with.

~~~
jopt
I think you're taking a huge leap in your reasoning. Sure, I want lots of
people I know on the network. But beyond the roughly 200 of those, I don't
care if the network has a hundred thousand users or a hundred million.

Before facebook, social networks could provide a lot of value by saturating
small demographics. Example: If all Swedish teenagers are on playahead.se and
can all talk to each other there, they don't gain much from network expansion.
The reason those networks need to grow beyond the clique where they're
successful is that their business model can't sustain itself on a small number
of paying users.

If app.net saturates the demographic of "people who care enough about
Twitter's new API to chance $50 away," I could talk to 50% of my Twitter
circle even if the total number of users on app.net is only 1% of Twitter's.

~~~
sirclueless
Most people I know couldn't give two hoots about talking to random people on
the internet, even interesting random people. All they care about is their
friends (and maybe famous/notable people). If your social network contains <
100,000 people, chances are it doesn't contain many friends, so most people
will discount it. Now, us techies are used to a degree of anonymity, and are
used to interacting with people we haven't met, so I don't think it is
impossible that app.net will be successful in that demographic. I think it is
akin to Netflix: some people just want to watch a movie, it doesn't really
matter which one so long as it is a decent one; these people might like
Netflix. But others only really care about that specific movie their friend
said was good; chances are Netflix doesn't stream it, and they will be
disappointed.

