Fluttr
The professional network with a heart
Fluttr
The professional network with a heart
Fluttr is a professional network that helps people connecting with others that share the same passions; interact with them, share ideas, opportunities, news and events and even meet them face to face. It all begins with local communities and people around you.
The most active members are connected with similar communities around the world thus acquiring additional knowledge, making new connections and fostering professional opportunities.
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We hate spam, trust me. We said from start that our network will be successful only if there are three key elements built in it: Trust, Interaction and Quality. Spam kills all of them.
So we have downvotes built in the feed. Somebody getting too many downvotes too quickly from their community is then restricted from posting in Fluttr. Another thing is a velocity and time check. Our intention is to block automated posts.
Ours is not a platform where we want sellers to sell their services as in other professional networks. We want Fluttr to be built on community of people that are passionate about specific topics and where that can find the right people and knowledge; so that one day they can transform their passion in something far more meaningful.
Thanks for the question Dannon. I hope we answered your question.
Or is it a community professionals, who interact with each other based on interests?
Fluttr is based on (local at first) communities of people that together share and learn from each other on topics that they are passionate about (i.e Machine Learning, Design, Startups...any that has a professional value).
Our idea is that we then take people from these local communities and put them in touch with people from similar communities elsewhere in the world or with complementary communities locally (for example if you are passionate about startups, you are probably interested in UX, UI, Marketing etc...).
The end game is to connect users and communities. We believe that through facilitating these encounters will then help people achieve their dream job (ie. creating their own startup, get into a music band, be part of a NGO etc...).
Fluttr is not a portal to find a job. It is the platform to get closer to do something far more important.
I hope it is clear :)
In the end our hope is really to be able to transform people lives. We don't want to create a "hobbies" network, but we hope to do much more: creating the conditions that will allow people to go after their passions and live a fulfilling life.
This is a really personal opinion, but that transformation comes only if you do what you love full time. So that is why the word "job" is so relevant.
Nonetheless you as others have told us that the current wording does not fit the bill as the simple word "job" is associated with boredom...and what we are trying to do is not :)
We hope to have the messaging well done and completed by the end of the Beta. That's why feedbacks like yours are really welcome and appreciated.
Keep them coming!
The idea is that we will have communities of writers (actually we are talking to one of these communities in Barcelona already) so that you could share ideas and get ideas from other writers and hopefully find inspiration. So you could find it within your own local community or starting interacting with communities outside of your city or country.
Additionally we hope that as part of these communities there would also be talent scouts or editors so that if somebody like your work and writings you might find your right connection and publish the great book you deserve.
I know that life is not that easy, we just hope to make it easier and more interesting by connecting like-minded people with similar passions.
Any other question let us know!
Are you planning to be free and monetise users' data or will there be a way to pay and own one's data and not be spied on? And if it's the latter, how can you avoid going the way of the dodo (app.net) and instead be a sustainable indie?
Thanks! :)
Here's the set of principles that we will follow and I think can give you a good idea of what we will try to do.
One point is very clear to us: we are not going to resell data to third parties for them to use and spam our users or communities. So data will always stay within our four walls and not accessible to third parties (unless users expressly consent to it and do request to share their data on purpose - think of the "social login case" for example...).
Our thoughts on monetisation are a few at this point, mostly in-feed advertising (Facebook style), but we want to get to a higher level of relevance for the ads...i.e. a community about "guitar playing" will see ads in their feed about local stores running promotions, local guitar concerts, places where to throw a local gig etc...The key principle is relevance and definitely not quantity. One click for every 10 ads is far better than 1 click for 100 ads...so this is what we will try to do. And just to make sure this is clearer, we will block bots from posting on our feeds.
Could users pay to see no ads? It's an option, sure. My personal view is that if advertising is relevant and timely is a great service. The problem today is that there are too many irrelevant ads everywhere. Companies spend a lot of money for impressions, but in my opinion impressions alone are a vanity metric. On the other side as consumers we see too many ads that are completely irrelevant to us. So there is clear problem and until money is core and revenue is driven by advertising based on vanity metrics, then that problem will not be solved. In the end as a general statement a startup has potentially more ways to fix the problems of an established industry, because they have not got a legacy to deal with...
The privacy of our users is critical and fundamental. We must establish a strong level of trust with our users and privacyi-breaking-behaviours will be a slow killer for us. For example just the other day I received (to my personal email box) an email with an ad from an insurance company. It was sent by a social network I had signed up to, as somehow I saw it competing with us. I profoundly disliked that email and that social network for sending it over. I felt my privacy was violated, I had never agreed to it and more importantly it was completely irrelevant to me.
I can 100% assure you that Fluttr will never ever do that.
As a side note...I am not into this for money. Don't get me wrong, money is good if used wisely, but I left a very well paid employment to start Fluttr, I have not been earning a penny since (t's months now) and I am extremely happy nonetheless. I am loving what I am doing and one day I hope to tell my children that I contributed to do something good. That's why we started Fluttr and are so excited about it.
Not sure if I fully answered your question, but I hope so. If not, I am happy to explain things further.
Thank you!
Not doing it for the money is good to hear, but yes, money is what allows you guys to operate, so a healthy balance is key. If you don't mind, I'll ramble a little further, maybe it explains more…
I was an ADN backer and I found it to be a rather compelling alternative to Twitter because it had a paid subscription. Sadly, free seemed tough to displace without deep VC pockets (my speculation). So with LinkedIn, Meetup, Dribbble and similar networks already in place, it's a challenging road ahead to critical mass.
Besides unwanted and irrelevant spam, what peeves me with big social networks:
1. Profiling & selling of my meta-data, preferences and social graph (Facebook)
2. Messing with my timeline (Facebook, tho Twitter experimented)
3. Using my data for their benefit, but me being liable for it (LinkedIn)
4. Forcing people to be in there for everything, being a walled garden (FB & LinkedIn)
While #4 can be understood to a certain point, they mostly still do feel like creepy uncles.
So if you plan to have a paid tier with pro features (or paid InMail or similar), I would hope that to be putting the humans using it first, along the lines of ind.ie's ethical design manifesto.
Happy to discuss more. :)
Have a nice day!
"LinkedIn = you are your current job and what's in your CV
Fluttr = you are your passions, talents and attitude"
https://twitter.com/FluttrSocial/status/755174746313097216
As I said to Vazgen our hope is to have people make of their passions and talents and interests a far more important part of their lives. To me this is in stark contrast to what Linkedin does and represent.
To summarise...we will definitely change our messaging. Any thought or suggestion is welcome. Thank you :)
Summarising something complex in just a few words is such a complex matter :) so many thanks for your inputs. I personally love the last one...don't claim any copyright please! We are bootstrapping ;)