It's somewhat premature and reactionary to be a doomsayer with regards to Color.
Fact is, Sequoia isn't a fly-by-night operation. No doubt they're investing in the idea, the team and the (non-public) direction it's going. I wouldn't be so quick to declare failure.
Spontaneous geo connections, which seems to be the idea (like most other people, I don't quite "get it" yet), is an interesting idea. It reminds me a little of Twitter, actually.
Still, it does make me worry when a company makes a big splash with what seems to be poor execution (the app). Time will tell.
In the current environment I hesitate to predict failure of any kind, particularly with that much runway. Chances are that the worst outcome is going to be a breakeven to moderate exit due to a Facebook or Google talent acquisition. After all, it's social, it's mobile, it's local... pack in those buzzwords!
For people who don't "get it" (like me), ask yourself this: did you "get" Twitter when it first started? I know I didn't. If you're honest enough to say you didn't (because I bet virtually everyone didn't) then take pause before declaring failure.
I felt like I "got" Twitter right from the get-go because Leo Laporte did a pretty good job of explaining it and hyping it up on TWiT right after it launched.
I still haven't figured out Evernote. I mean I get the idea, but I haven't been able to get any use out of it that I wouldn't get from Pinboard, but the fact that Evernote is pretty successful just lets me know that I don't have to personally "get it" for it to work.
From what little I've used of Evernote, it's the OCR capabilities which seem like the killer feature. Photograph or scan a receipt and be able to search it anytime. I don't know how well it works but it seems pretty useful.
But these days everyone wants to be the first one to call a failure a failure. Why? Well, it’s a lot easier than predicting a winner. Read an interesting article on the Color phenomenon http://thegeoffreyhull.com/post/4094961998 that describes almost an insatiable desire of the blogosphere to see Color fail
Fact is, Sequoia isn't a fly-by-night operation. No doubt they're investing in the idea, the team and the (non-public) direction it's going. I wouldn't be so quick to declare failure.
Spontaneous geo connections, which seems to be the idea (like most other people, I don't quite "get it" yet), is an interesting idea. It reminds me a little of Twitter, actually.
Still, it does make me worry when a company makes a big splash with what seems to be poor execution (the app). Time will tell.
In the current environment I hesitate to predict failure of any kind, particularly with that much runway. Chances are that the worst outcome is going to be a breakeven to moderate exit due to a Facebook or Google talent acquisition. After all, it's social, it's mobile, it's local... pack in those buzzwords!
For people who don't "get it" (like me), ask yourself this: did you "get" Twitter when it first started? I know I didn't. If you're honest enough to say you didn't (because I bet virtually everyone didn't) then take pause before declaring failure.