Thoughts on Ello

There is a new social network making the rounds.  It is called Ello, and I was recently granted the chance to try it out.  First impressions were good.  The site is minimalist and elegant, reminiscent more of the old, classic iPod than anything else.  It is also reminiscent of the Facebook of my high-school years, rather than the one of today.  The font hearkens back to the heady BBS days of the 1980's, when you logged in by dialling a phone number, and text either appeared on your screen or was printed out.  I approve greatly.

I have a few quibbles, though.  One is about the business model.  They pledge not to use advertisements on their network, or to give your data to third parties.  Their manifesto (how very Communist of them) contains something along the lines of, you are not the product.  The problem is, when you operate a free site, your clients must be the product.  Any other free business model is either unsustainable, or not truly free.  This is the case with so-called "freemium" products: more often than not, they are intentionally hobbled to such an extent that usability is impaired.  In plain English, they fuck you at every turn, tell you to stand and deliver, and then they don't even have the common courtesy of giving you a reach round.  They have no fucking choice: they need the money.  It's as simple as that.

The Ello management is, justifiably, reticent about where they got their money: nearly half a million dollars.  They do say that it came from a venture capitalist group.  Venture capitalists are known for having fists so tight that if you gave them a lump of coal to hold onto, it would turn into a diamond a minute later.  Kickstarter people just want a product to use and are dedicated enough to pay to have it made; venture capitalists want a return on investment.  They will not support a product just because it looks pretty or because it works.  Venture capitalists eat greenbacks and shit product.

The key word is "exit".  Venture capitalists pay money for an opportunity to exit.  This comes in two ways: a buyout (big shark, little shark, little shark gets eaten) or a flotation (little shark, school of piranhas, little shark gets eaten).  Examples?  Facebook got floated.  Google got floated.  Instagram got bought out.  Skype got bought out.  In any case, idealism goes down the longkang and the manifesto goes out the window.  Such is the price to pay for venture capital.  There are ways to defeat this.  One way would be to use venture capital as, in effect, a loan.  The Ello management could solicit people to buy shares, and buy out the vampire capitalists in the process.  Of course, such a thing will get you burned, thanks to said vampires.  "Don't buy, you'll be bought out", and all that jazz.  Good luck getting a penny more.

There are a few exceptions, like this online marketplace that I won't name.  Suffice it to say that it was invented by a man named Jeff B. and, apparently, run by members of the American investment community as a non-profit for the benefit of consumers everywhere.  Profit?  What's that?  But this ain't Ama---whoops, I said I wouldn't name it.

The way I see this, though, is like a really good party.  Facebook was a fun underground party at the beginning: it started with just a velvet rope, a bouncer to check student ID, trendy liquor, and some ultra-modern furnishings.  At this point, it was just you and your classmates from Harvard, Yale, Cambridge, what have you.  Then they let high school students in, and the party got wilder (but lost a lot of its maturity).  The bouncer got too expensive, so they fired him.  People started flooding in and they wore out all the furniture.  That got replaced, but it was replaced with stuff of lesser quality.  They got a game console in to attract even more people, but that's when the party got weird.  Eventually, even grannies and grand-dads got in on the act, and, let me tell you, if your granny goes to the same parties as you do, it's time to pull chocks and take off.

Google Plus has some of the same quirks, but it arguably never was a good party, and people saw it.  You go in, and it's like, "Is there anybody alive out there?"  I mean, it's all right for the sweater vest and red-trouser crowd, but come on.  It's like going to a Christmas party at the office.  Nobody actually has fun on there, do they.  Do they?

Ello will likely go through the same phases.  I wish it won't, but it will.  All parties have to come to an end someday: it happened to Tagged, it happened to MySpace, it happened to Facebook... so let's just enjoy the fucking party while it fucking lasts, and when it gets weird, just kick the tyres and light the fires.  On to the next one, and so on, ad nauseam (perhaps literally).   

The furniture at the Ello party, unfortunately, seems to be from IKEA.  It looks great, but it seems to be made in China, and as soon as you sit on the chairs to have a pint, BANG.  The chair breaks underneath you.  Some people have had the door fall off its hinges (browser crash at home page).  And then there are the people invited to this shindig.  From what I've seen, 99% of the Ello attendees are of three stripes.  A sizeable minority are businesses, there to network and to gain more customers.  Then there's the LesBiGayTrans crowd, tired of what they see as discriminatory policies at Facebook.  Or just because the party got weird... but then again, they are largely a liberal crowd, and, as such, will seek any reason under God's bright sun to protest.  Liberals love to protest like gin loves tonic.  Finally, there's the $500 pram, organic-everything, neck-beard, thrift-store, fixed-gear bike, chunky black plastic specs crowd.  I understand the word "hipster" is too mainstream (isn't it ironic?).  I guess they all got in because "you've probably never heard of it".

Let's see how this develops, though.  I managed to score an invite and will try to keep y'all posted on how things work... let's just hope that the 99% will shrink in proportion. I'm sick and tired of the god damn hipsters.