Disclaimer
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2008
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2008
Hey readers!
I am back with my thoughts on yet another TechCrunch50 presenter. This time, I am going to talk about the one stop shop for bird lovers, BirdPost.
BirdPost is a site dedicated to bird lovers. The founders said that the bird watching industry was a $35 Billion industry (I think that was the number they gave). Despite this huge number, there is a real lack of a real destination site for bird lovers. BirdPost is without a doubt, that destination site.
BirdPost allows bird lovers to get and share information about any kind of bird. The site has a great ability to search for birds based on things like location so that the users can find birds in their location, which is where their iPhone application comes in handy. When somebody says that a type of bird has been spotted in a particular location, other users who care about that bird or location are alerted so that they know the bird they wanted to see has been spotted in an area near them. This service allows bird lovers to communicate and share stories about birds and locations so that users can go to areas to see birds that they never would have thought to go to otherwise.
The site and mobile application has a ton of features and huge potential. I believe this is the perfect sites for bird lovers without question. If you are a bird lover, you really want to check out this service as it will be your best friend.
As I recall, the business model is based around advertising and possibly some subscription services. Given that this is a $35 Billion industry, I don’t see people hesitating to pay for such a great service. I can’t wait to see where this company goes as it has the potential to soar with the eagles. Below is the presentation of the product.
Don’t forget to check back for more posts about the many TechCrunch50 companies and be sure to check out the posts I have already written as there are some companies worth hearing about. I will also be podcasting some thoughts later this week, so make sure to check the main site for that.
-Jeremy “pcnerd37” Bray
Pizza fuels my blogging and podcasting passion. If you enjoy my blogs and podcasts, show your appreciation by donating to my pizza fund!
XHTML:
More Options ...
Categories
Tag Cloud
Blog RSS
Comments RSS
Void 
Life « Default
Earth 
Wind 
Water 
Fire Light
Previous: 
Next: 
Comment Meta:
Last 50 Posts 
Back
10:42 am - September 16th, 2008
Birdpost is a blatant rip-off of the NONPROFIT eBird project that has been around for years.
Much of the Birdpost application seems to be a repackaging of some of eBird’s new features like Google Mapping, Notable Birds Gadget, etc.
They obviously used existing eBird features as the kernel, added a few unimpressive social networking ‘bells and whistles’ (which birders won’t care about) and voila.
And unlike eBird, Birdpost is of zero value to bird researchers and conservationists, since Birdpost data is very poorly screened for misidentifications, spurious reports and “nut job” birders compared to eBird and other real citizen-science projects.
I urge birders to use eBird instead - after all, it not only lets you record, track, map, search, alerts, etc. - but it also helps conserve the birds we care about.
Birdpost is a for-profit ripoff of an existing nonprofit product.
For Shame!
Regarding later plans for other non-avian wildlife: those will having harmful effects when used on, say reptiles (since both legal and illegal commercial turtle and snake collectors can use the Internet too).