If you follow the references, the story seems a little bit saner than CNBC makes it sound: Or Arbel didn't raise 1MM from institutional VCs, but rather (FT reports, without any details on the terms or confirmatory details) from his former boss at a company called Mobli, who apparently has an "angel fund". That boss, Moshe Hogeg, had in the same time frame commissioned an app from Arbel.
So, contra the impression you'd get from second- and third- hand reports of this story, some unknown guy did not spend 8 hours coding an app that just says "Yo", tour it to venture capitalists, and pick up 1MM.
I can see the value in this, it's the same value that agencies get from metadata.
I might be sending a "yo" cos I'm home, I might be sending a "yo" because I'm out of weed, I might be receiving a "yo" because my pizza is about to arrive.
In all these cases it's the metadata that matters, I can infer the rest from that.
Oh God... I hope it's some sort of joke I didn't get?
HNers are talking that they can't like favourite artists on FB because they are afraid to be affiliated with gangs. Or that liking something might help to detect that the user is gay (I didn't make that up).
I mean, yeah privacy is serious. But if you think someone actually cares and tries to find some meaning in a teenage kid saying 'yo'...
But if you think someone actually cares and tries to find some meaning in a teenage kid saying 'yo'...
Yeah, they do. And they can. In fact, in Snowden's most recent interview, he explained how even something as benign as searching for football game scores on their smartphone can lead to lots of information being revealed about that person, simply from all the metadata web applications, protocols and phones emit.
It may sound ridiculous to you, but it isn't. Data is precious.
You can't derive context from just a "yo." (to clarify: you can't derive context from this app alone, since all you can do is send "yo"s. There isn't enough information to formulate a why. Facebook/Twitter, of course, could make more use out of the "yo"s, but they already have that data.)
You can if there is a pre-arrangement, or at least the sender and the recipient. Its essentially a contextual "ping" that only the sender and receiver understand, usually from a different channel.
It being easier allows people to drive, spend less time texting when meeting up, etc. Silly use case? Sure. But look at the install base.
I can't believe I hated on Slingshot, but am actually giving this credit.
"Not just a means of simple but effective communication, Yo is a way of life. Since downloading Yo, all my relationships have improved and I've regrown most of my hair. My girlfriend no longer complains that I don't text her enough, I just Yo that b. Mom no longer asks why I don't call when I just sent that b a Yo."
It should be noted that Yo has the Snapchat-esque we-cater-to-teens UI and UX that other apps like Tinder and Slingshot have adopted. (bright pastel colors, whimsical fonts, app incredibly unintuitive to navigate due to excessive minimalism, etc.)
I'm beginning to think you could make literally any kind of app with that kind of paradigm and get funding.
Reviews on Play seem to be full of "I only installed this app because <friend> told me about it."
It's actually kind of interesting; you don't really need much of an onboarding flow because either you play with it to figure out how to use it (and apologize for the accidental notifications later) or you are told by a friend and they tell you how to use it.
Reading this made me feel a wide range of emotions. But mainly, seriously, wtf...?
Who is funding those apps? This just doesn't propose any value to the user other than momentary coolness (like most other apps for teenagers). Once it fades away, it will be just one of 'cool' apps, like there are thousands of them already.
Or is that $1M with crap-loads of various clauses for releasing money and after all it's actually just a few grands and just some nice PR stuff because media loves $1M?
Are the investors just some rich people who are like 'startups! yeah! I watched Social Network! this will print the money yo!'? Or is there something I don't see?
If not, I just find it a bit insulting to founders who work their butts off with decent projects.
In case you were wondering how this new app is better than Facebook Poke, apparently [0] Yo allows group yo's as well as double yo's. So you effectively have morse code broadcast to a select group.
>Thus far, it has attracted over 50,000 users, who have sent about 4 million "yos."
You can buy likes and followers. Can you buy app downloads and usage? How much of your user specifics and metrics do you have to disclose to your funding sources?
This app is extremely easy to dismiss. As someone else mentioned, if you send a yo to "WORLDCUP" you get a yo everytime someone scores. I could see this getting wired into IFTT and actually becoming useful "automatically send a yo to my friend every time I visit his city", "Have my plants send me a yo when they need some water", "Send a yo to me when kid gets home from school". These things maybe extremely annoying to some, but useful to others. It seems so dumb, as did snapchat, but when you start to use it you see it is actually kind of novel.
Why bother sending these messages via yo? All that does is make it harder to understand them. You could have your plants text you when they need water, and the message would contain information itself (the zero bits of information you get from "yo" mean whenever you get the message you have to remember what you originally defined it to mean) and be your choice of more accommodating to the user's choice of platform or more robust in the face of yo service failure. You don't get anything out of the yo layer of the stack.
I must admit you are absolutely correct. I guess I was thinking it would be more like a ping or a blip, something to trigger more investigation via another app or channel. Nothing text messages couldn't solve, but just a bucket for blips I guess.
I also kind of like the lack of extra information, because it may seem like there is no context but really it would be encoded between the yodlers. If I get a "yo" from my buddy maybe I secretly know that he doesn't want to talk but really wants to smoke some weed downstairs. Again, texts could solve this same problem so I am not sure why I am fascinated by the simplicity, stupidity and possibilities of this app.
I can't think of anything less useful and more annoying. If I'm watching a game, I don't need to be told when there's a goal. If I'm not, I don't want to be bothered by random 'yo's all the time - especially if I'm not told who scored.
It is my understanding that goals aren't all that common in soccer; that particular example actually made a certain amount of sense to me. Then again, I don't watch sports. But the fear of getting "random yos all the time" from the world cup seems a little overblown?
Wikipedia lists the following scores for the past few world cups:
Are you sure you aren't looking at the finale scores only? So far the world cup has seen 53 goals in 18 matches, and we're only about a quarter through.
No, I'm pretty sure you're correct. See my above disclaimer.
Three goals a match, though, still seems more like something rare enough that you might prefer to focus your attention elsewhere and be alerted when they happen than like something that will slowly drive you insane. Do the matches happen at predictable times?
Useful if you are at work or watching something else. You get the "yo" and switch channels or browser windows to see the replays. I could see this working for baseball as well. Sure there is something nice about watching a full game of soccer, but if I watched every game is the World Cup, I'd get nothing done during the day.
What if you are 10 minutes behind a recorded game, then you get a yo, wouldn't you know to should start watching without the surprise of who scored being ruined? Seems legit to me. If you want to know who scored then you will probably be able to add WORLDCUP_USA_GOALS in a matter of hours.
Maybe you want a Yo from your favorite artist every time they are in town?
Maybe you want a Yo from your favorite TV shows before they come on TV to remind you?
Maybe you want a Yo from your friend when they are near you?
Was sniffing around for access to their api in the app binary, found some hidden features instead: guess they are going to monetise with custom sounds/yos.
I think this sorta proves that we've reached the bubble peak.
After this startup bubble pops, we are going to see investors who are very wary of companies that thinks we are in a new economy now and that non-paying users is the way to billions.
Investors fund growth. This app has demonstrated growth.
Isn't $1M pretty much pocket change for big investment funds? What if this app becomes the next Snapchat?
Users give leverage. If the team is dedicated, and they can pivot their adoption into long-term growth, then it was a good investment.
Startup investing is counter-intuitive by nature. It's counter-intuitive for most people to think of $1M as a small amount of money, but to a fund it might be. And if it's a small amount of money, then there's no downside to invest in them. Whereas if they miss their chance to invest in the next big company, then those same investors will ultimately lose, because the entire model of VC depends on (a) investing in a big winner, (b) early.
EDIT: Well, that's what I get for not researching before speaking. 1MM in this case was a large amount of money for any angel investor. But the premise of investing early in a big winner is the central idea.
So, contra the impression you'd get from second- and third- hand reports of this story, some unknown guy did not spend 8 hours coding an app that just says "Yo", tour it to venture capitalists, and pick up 1MM.