Besides looking nice (though everything is just too small to read), what else does Path offer? A Facebook without the user base? Sure. But I fail to see the advantage in that. It feels like "it’s a custom-designed, one-of-a-kind bespoke app Morin had built for his assistant and him to communicate and collaborate through" (http://jesuschristsiliconvalley.tumblr.com/post/46539276780/...)
The way it was perceived in Indonesia, is that Path had been bought by the Bakrie group.
I think in the bigger scheme of things, the $25M is a 'marketing' money well spent. Reason being, Aburizal Bakrie looks to run for the presidential election and this investment provided him with a very positive image.
Path's brand image is still relatively intact in Indonesia, as compared to USA (where the privacy concerns has tarnished it).
It's all to do with one's status, and Indonesian election is more or less a popularity contest. Of course, you'd get more points in investing in a household name (i.e. Path), especially being a 'Western' company.
The effect is similar to Erick Thohir's [1] stake in Intermilan, D.C. United, and 76ers. He's probably more popular than the President right now ;)
So, the privacy concerns, contact stealing and phone spamming rumours were all, well, rumours?
I mean there's a reason behind their non-existent user base. I stopped using it when all my friends got an email from them. All! Even my professors, and company managers, my MD. Then they received those emails all over again.
Wasn't this also the time that it became clear lots of apps (including Twitter and Foursquare) were doing the same thing - Path was the only one to get in trouble for it though and the others silently removed those 'features' from their apps.
They had pretty major controversies. They were
burning through an enormous amount of money on marketing
and
then silently inviting friends on Facebook controversy.
The team should just be hired by another company in a similar space! Their app looks nice, functions well, but... is used by no-one. It's a shame, but after the privacy issues you can easily see why.
A lot of people wonder who is using Path, or if it is even being used. Most of these people live in Western societies. If you go into places where young women are not so keen on expressing themselves in public -- where, for example, it might not even be allowed -- Path is doing exceptionally well. These aren't exactly places in the world where people don't have money, either.
Now, based on the sort of completely ignorant comments I have seen on Hacker News as of late regarding people in non-Western societies, and regarding women, I would expect most of you to know nothing about these things. Do yourselves a favor and please shut the fuck up when you don't actually know anything about a particular subject, and base all of your supposed "knowledge" on sensationalist tech journalism and gossip sites.
Sorry kids, just because you made an account on a social network site and know how to code an app does NOT mean you understand ANYTHING about how the social network space works. And none of you know anything about Dave Morin, so you should really avoid making fools of yourselves by talking about him. There's a lot that bothers me about Dave, such as his high number of douchey friends (and I tell him this everytime I see him), but he is far from incompetent and stupid. Most of you newcomers to our industry don't even know that Dave was responsible for Facebook's Groups feature, which he designed as a means for getting his employer at the time (a little company called Apple) on board as Facebook's first advertiser. He isn't a wannabe who made a social network to be trendy.
I wish reading HN comments these days didn't make me so angry. Ugh. Sorry for those of you who sense my negativity.
Hey Numair, I agree with you on the negativity. It's not good for anyone. Path is exquisitely designed and the product team are top notch.
That being said, websites like App Annie provide reasonably detailed metrics on downloads and popularity in iOS and Android stores and what you've just said doesn't really tie out. Besides Indonesia, it's really not doing well.
Important interactions can happen on almost any social network, Path isn't inherently bad, but that doesn't justify it being valued or hyped like it is. There is A LOT of money at play here - and a large portion of that money comes from things like retirement funds, pension funds, etc.
I think that annoys a lot of technologists who work hard and get overlooked - you know, those who believe that meritocracy rules in SV instead of connections.
Hey Dmitri -- I agree with you, the stats don't add up... But my own (completely external, third-party) study of the social dynamics of the usage of the app paint a different picture. I should note that I had written off the app myself until very recently, when this interesting trend started to kick off. Although I don't have access to any inside data, and the charts don't seem to show what's going on, I was one of the first 5 people on Path, and I have one of the only usernames on the service (n), so my account tends to feel the effects of usage patterns before they become macro-patterns. What I'm seeing doesn't paint a picture of a dead network, just one that doesn't seem to have any usage in any Western countries.
Once again, I'll note that this is different from what I saw 18 months ago. If you had talked to me at that time, I would have said Dave was screwed. And if he wastes his time focusing in the Western market (such as is evidenced by screenshots of users based in San Francisco), it might still be the case. Path is no longer a Western network, and that's totally okay -- it was never a Western network anyway. I didn't even use the product during the whole spam debacle, which I would blame on Dave's poor judgement in hiring douchey employees in decision-making roles (I think there's a Mother Jones article somewhere that might allude to what I'm talking about). I'm guessing a lot of the new users of Path didn't even know about the app during that time (again, keep in mind that the demographic waves for smartphone usage mean that there are entirely new groups of users who have zero knowledge of what went on a few years ago).
Edit: Also, there is nothing non-meritocratic about Path/Dave raising money. He was in the game when most of you thought it was a joke. And unlike a lot of people who have made money, he actually did something for it. If you're bitter about this, the issues are your own.
I know you are deeply interested in social apps, and have invaluable insight into their workings from early days at Facebook and personal in-depth research. I'm pretty sure you were username n on an app I built too...
But in my experience, despite having very active and passionate users, the lowest form of interaction always wins out on a free social service. Lack of interactions means user churn - no matter how good or important the interactions that take place actually are.
In that sense, social apps themselves are just vessels for human interaction - and great human interaction happens all over the place whether an app exists or not. Your goal as a venture backed social app is to focus those interactions and try to monetize them.
Is Path going to be one of those handful of "lucky" networks where those interactions happen in large enough numbers to make it viable financially? Personally I wouldn't bet on it.
"I would expect most of you to know nothing about these things."
"Do yourselves a favor and please shut the fuck up"
"Sorry kids, just because you made an account on a social network site and know how to code an app does NOT mean you understand ANYTHING about how the social network space works."
"none of you know anything about Dave Morin"
Finally somebody is pointing out the absurd generalizations and assumptions made here on Hacker News! Thank you Numair!
