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Pownce From Possible Deadpool To Here For The Long-Term Says Arrington
Pownce will be opening its doors to the public tomorrow and will launch some new features says Mike Arrington over at TechCrunch who got a sneak peak. Arrington seems to have turned around his view on Pownce relatively quickly as just a month ago Arrington said regarding Pownce, "there is probably only room for one Twitter in this world, and Twitter itself seems determined to hang in there." This was in regards to a story by Uncov that Pownce was headed for the deadpool and not even "Techcrunch could save it".
Today Arrington has apparently changed his tune on Pownce and notes, "Who knows, they (Pownce) may be here long after many of today’s "hot" startups are a distant memory." Here is a summary of the new features that apparently have changed his opinion:
- no more private beta, anyone can join
- updated, faster desktop client
- looks like you can add friends from other networks not just Pownce friends – not exactly sure how that works as of yet
- they have a new list of "featured followers" which Arrington says won’t just be a list of top users, but rather an editorialized list – will be interesting to see who shows up there
- there is an updated events page as well
Personally the mentioned updates aren’t that exciting to me — but moving out of private beta is the big shift and should show the viability for Pownce to shift into high gear. The issue for Pownce will continue to be whether it can draw in the names that have legions of followers; this is how the app will move to viral status and grow to Twitter-like levels. On a side note, I listed Pownce developer Leah Culver as one of 23 people I’d like to meet this year.
Check out all of our Pownce coverage — I continue to believe that Pownce is "pretty freakin’ sweet!" And heck, Pownce has a basic business model, something more than Twitter currently has.
In case you are using Pownce, you can friend me here. Here is our initial video review from last summer:
I am sure they will get the diggards to join up but I get the feeling they lost their edge and stayed private for too long. I don’t think twitters will swap for it.
It depends if the valley bloggers keep on blogging about it to help their friend out because lets face it they do.
These features don’t excite me either, but then again, I’m not excited by much of anything in Web 2.0 so I’m probably biased. Obviously, opening up its service to a larger audience will do a lot for Pownce and I like the fact that they have some semblance of a business model, even though I’m not convinced that any of these services will ever be able to generate enough revenue to justify the hype (and investment).
The only question I have, however, for you Allen, is this: Twitter went “viral” yet none of my friends actually know what Twitter is. I am not a Silicon Valley guy and I don’t hang with the blogosphere clique, so for all of the talk about Twitter, is either of these services realistically going to go “mainstream”?
I don’t think Pownce has any outside investment at this point. Frankly I think Leah would be better getting rid of any Digg involvement and just going out on her own.
Twitter works because there are enough techies to make it work and enough sheep. Pownce can do the same thing.
Will either of them go mainstream? Not sure, I think the mobile functions will be a big part – and clearly Twitter is the best mobile product this year says their crunchy award. (i dont have a mobile device so I have no idea how it works)
I still like the look of Pownce WAY better than twitter – the threading alone is worth the price of admission.
My main concern with Pownce is that I have to get all my friends to switch over or register an account for it to provide maximum value. This is very unlikely to happen.
It’s like signing up for a new IM client. You need to get all your old contacts on board for it to provide value.
I see this as being the biggest hurdle for the company. As it stands, most of my friends and contacts are on Facebook, and I can share all I want on there. Others prefer LinkedIn. I think SNs are Pownce’s biggest competitors – not Twitter. Just my two bits…
Cheers,
Aidan
http://www.MappingTheWeb.com