WebProNews

Tag: betaworks

  • Bloglovin’ Aims To Get Some Google Reader Users With New Apps

    Bloglovin’, one of the many news reader apps that would like to get some of Google Reader’s users on board as the service dies, has launched new apps for iPad and Android. Previously, it was only available on mobile via iPhone and web apps.

    “With the new bloglovin iPad & Android apps, you can add any blog on the web to your personal feed, read articles from your favorite blogs in one beautiful feed, and discover the best posts in fashion, beauty, interior design, food, DIY, and other lifestyle categories,” a spokesperson tells WebProNews.

    Obviously this won’t be the ideal Google Reader replacement for all users, but for those whose interests are in line with those mentioned, it could be worth at least giving a shot. Its users are 90% women, according to the company, which compares itself to Pinterest in that way, and says it drives “significant traffic with that demographic.”

    Bloglovin’ already has 2 million users, and 4.5 million unique monthly visitors. In fact, the service went from 3 to 4.8 million uniques over the first six to seven weeks after the Google Reader announcement.

    Last year, Betaworks participated in a $1 million seed funding round in Bloglovin’, which is interesting, considering that the company also owns Digg, which is readying its own Google Reader competitor. Other investors include Lerer Ventures, RRE Ventures, Bruce Jaffe, Hank Vigil, and Fritz Lanman.

    “Bloglovin’ sits across from Digg and is also a BetaWorks company,” the spokesperson says.

    This is an interesting strategy on Betaworks’ part going after the Google Reader crowd with multiple products as opposed to a one-size-fits-all approach. More on what Digg is up to here.

    The apps can be found in Google Play and the Apple App Store.

  • Betaworks Follows Digg Purchase With Instapaper Acquisition

    Betaworks, the company behind Bit.ly, news.me, Chartbeat, and now Digg, has added Instapaper to is portfolio.

    Instapaper has served as a nice complement to news readers like Google Reader (or whatever you’re using these days). It’s great for when you find things you want to read later that you didn’t actually get to through your reader, and don’t have easy access to the star feature. With Digg building a Google Reader replacement of its own, it will be interesting to see if Instapaper plays a role.

    Of course some current alternatives to Google Reader basically render Instapaper unnecessary. Feedly, for example, offers its version of the Google Reader starring for any page you visit on the web, and adds it to your reader. Still, the addition of Instapaper could be a key element of Digg’s creation. Either way, people already known and like Instapaper, and it will continue to have its own user base.

    John Borthwick told TechCrunch in an email that Instapaper will be a “perfect fit with Digg and its forthcoming reader.

    Instapaper creator Marco Arment discusses the situation in a blog post:

    When I launched Instapaper in 2008, it was a very basic web app. It quickly expanded to define the pillars of the read-later market: a one-click “read later” bookmarklet, a web sync service, an adjustable text view optimized for reading, and an iPhone app with offline saving. I did almost everything myself, which worked well for the first few years, but for the past year, I’ve had a lot of trouble keeping up with it.

    Instapaper is much bigger today than I could have predicted in 2008, and it has simply grown far beyond what one person can do. To really shine, it needs a full-time staff of at least a few people. But I wouldn’t be very good at hiring and leading a staff, and after more than five years, I’d like an opportunity to try other apps and creative projects. Instapaper needs a new home where it can be staffed and grown, but I didn’t want to give it to a big company that would probably just shut it down in six months.

    Being familiar with Betaworks (apparently eating lunch at their office a lot), Arment figured they’d be the right company to acquire a majority stake in Instapaper. Betaworks evidently agreed.

    According to Arment, the deal is structured so that Instapaper will remain a top priority, and he will continue to advise the project indefinitely.

  • Digg Is Being Rebuilt From Scratch And It Needs Your Help

    We brought you the news last week that Digg was bought for a paltry $500,000. Granted, that wasn’t the full story as Digg was split apart and sold to numerous buyers. Betaworks bought the domain and copyright for reasons that weren’t revealed until today.

    Betaworks, as part of a new blog, asks its readers to “Rethink Digg.” Here’s what they have to say:

    As betaworks and Digg both announced on their blogs, we are taking over Digg and turning it back into a startup. What they didn’t mention is that we’re rebuilding it from scratch. In six weeks.

    On August 1, after an adrenaline and caffeine-fueled six weeks, we’re rolling out a new v1. With this launch, we’re taking the first step towards (re)making Digg the best place to find, read and share the most interesting and talked about stories on the Internet — and we want your help.

    As for the details, the team at Betaworks’ News.me is going to be rebuilding Digg as a new service for people to share news. They are building the new Digg on for key tenants:

  • We make it easy to find, read, and share the most interesting and talked about stories on the Internet.
  • The experience must be fast and thin. Let users go, and they will come back to you. We optimize for return visits, not pageviews per visit.
  • Build an experience that is native to each device: smart phone, inbox, Web page. Stories must find the user, wherever they are.
  • Users must be able to share where they and their friends already are — on networks like Facebook, Twitter and email.

    • Upon these principles, the team hopes to resurrect Digg while continuing work on News.me. After both products are up to snuff, they want to integrate both into the same service under the Digg brand. They also want to do away with the negative brand image that Digg has gotten over the years and create “the beginning of a new generation for Digg – a restoration of what was brilliant and disruptive and a reinvention of what was not.”

    So, I’ll guess we’ll find out on August 1 if the new Digg is anything worth checking out. It’s already pretty obvious that Reddit is the new king on the block and Digg has a lot of ground to cover. The team at News.me seems pretty passionate about Digg, however, and it will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

    As an aside, they want users to fill out a short survey to tell them where you want Digg to go next. It will help them “rethink Digg.”

  • Digg Parted Out, Sold For Significantly More Than $500,000 [REPORT]

    Late yesterday, we told you that once-popular link aggregation site Digg had been sold to Betaworks, the company behind bit.ly, news.me, and Chartbeat. Considering Digg’s massive decline over the past few years, news of it selling wasn’t too shocking. But the price was – a paltry $500,000.

    To put that in perspective, Facebook just bought Instagram for $1 billion. Seriously, $500,000 is embarrassingly low.

    But there may be more to the Digg story. Sources tell Tech Crunch that Digg’s sale price was actually closer to $16 million – a huge jump from the half a million we were told.

    They say that Betaworks did pick up Digg’s remaining assets for somewhere between $500,000 and $725,000. But that’s only after two other players payed substantially more for other parts of the company.

    Apparently, the Washington Post payed around $12 million for the Digg team. LinkedIn also joined the party, picking up a handful of Digg patents for around $4 million.

    If correct, this is better news for Digg – but it’s still not great news. Once mighty and valued at nearly triple what they were reportedly bought for, it’s kind of sad to see Digg ripped apart and parted off like a beat up car. I guess it just shows the importance of striking while the iron is hot.