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Curebit (YC W11) Raises $1.2 Million For Online Referral System
- karljacob 15y agogo curebit! Nice work
- channelmeter 15y agoAwesome job to Allan and team. Can't wait to try it for our own software.
- csallen 15y agoCongrats guys!
- wlll 15y agoYour new designer will be able to have a crack at an original homepage ;) http://i.imgur.com/fRI8Q.jpg http://i.imgur.com/fRI8Q.jpg http://i.imgur.com/KbQo0.jpg http://i.imgur.com/KbQo0.jpg
- samstave 15y agoHeh - wow. I'd like to hear this story; is it a curebit founder? Or maybe a CL freelancer they hired...
- dmix 15y agoI got a different homepage: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/533753/Screen%20Shot%202012-01-27%20at%203.28.47%20PM.png http://dl.dropbox.com/u/533753/Screen%20Shot%202012-01-27%20... It's possible they are experimenting with the 37signals design to see if it has legs, then will release a more original incarnation?
- wlll 15y agoI get the version you see when I use Chrome, I get the other version 100% of the time in Safari.
- stouset 15y agoThe choice of A/B test is stored in a cookie.
- sriramk 15y agoDHH just tweeted that they actually serve some of the assets from the Highrise site. That's bad http://yfrog.com/mm5icqhj http://yfrog.com/mm5icqhj
- re5et 15y agothey are asking to get those switched out with something horrible
- farmdawgnation 15y agoIn re the previous sub-comment about switching out the assets: I think some Ocean Marketing images are in order.
- asianmack 15y agoI like this guy.
- ZephyrP 15y agoWow, that's embarrassing.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- Xorlev 15y agoThus ensuring we will never do business with Curebit. That's lazy and unprofessional at best, even if you're A/B testing. Use Optimizely and host your own assets.
- outworlder 15y agoSo, these guys get YCombinator and other investors to give them $1.2M and they still have to rip off 37 signals' design. I wonder which startup got rejected in their place.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- nomadomatic 15y agoWhat if curebit copied highrise's product - not the design mind you, but the core functionality of the product - and used a completely different, original design to dress up the product? Would you throw a similar tantrum? This is something that's always perplexed me. Companies copy other companies' business models and compete for the same customers all the time, but that's considered fair game. But if a design is copied, shit hits the fan. Frankly, I'd rather someone copy my design and go after a diff niche of customers than copy my product and come after my customers. To the guys at Curebit - ignore this noise. The focus should be on creating an awesome product, getting paying customers and generating profits. You guys have an awesome product and deserve the funding. Congrats :) P.S. You should remove the hotlinks tho. No need to use their bandwidth.
- keesmacklin 15y agoWait, so are you saying that we should be more outraged when business models and customers are stolen in a borderline illegal way? This is a valid point and we probably should be more outraged. Or are you saying that it should be ok to rip off someone's design and hotlink to their assets?
- jamesau 15y agoAgreed.
- ahoyhere 15y agoWait, do you think that there aren't already 10s, maybe even a 100+ products out there with the same basic functionality as Highrise? Because there are. There were before Highrise, and now, after. There are more every year. The concept of a CRM is not something you can "copy" because it simply exists. And most web-based software works in roughly the same way. So far, most 37signals products have very few truly unique features, because their focus is on simplicity and less software. Accordingly, 37signals doesn't care if somebody launches a new CRM. They also don't seem to care when live chat apps like Hipchat have one or two features that 37signals pioneered. Stealing a design outright, on the other hand, is not growing or improving or adopting a concept (e.g. "contact management that tracks deals", "it should x when you y") but their actual IP.
- BrianMatch 15y agoPersonally, I don't think it's a big deal. The Curebits designer was obviously inspired by the Highrise design, but didn't copy it pixel-by-pixel. If it helps Curebits convert more customers then more power to them--it's not like they're stealing Highrise customers. Linking to someone else's assets, however, is just wrong.
- metalab 15y ago"but it didn't copy it pixel-by-pixel" They used their image assets. How much more pixel-by-pixel can you get?
- acrum 15y ago"Inspired"? Sorry, but are you trolling? It's about as close to an exact copy as you can get.
- outworlder 15y agoProbably, he meant that the happy smiling guy was replaced by another. They could have gone with a headset hottie instead (http://www.headsethotties.com/ http://www.headsethotties.com/).
- jsavimbi 15y agoThey didn't copy it pixel-by-pixel because they're either too lazy to do so, too stupid to know how or both. And no, there will be no power to them.
- comice 15y agoyou can make the smallest viable product even smaller when you pinch designs and externalise the costs of your asset hosting!
- jamesau 15y agoLOL. Eric Ries would be proud.
- allangrant 15y agoHey - I'm one of the founders of Curebit, and yes - it was a boneheaded move.. We had a different homepage, were a/b testing different pages, came across the 37signals post and were like 'wow we should see how that converts!' We are big fans of rails and what 37signals is doing and did not really think through the implications of what we were doing. We just kind of thought about it as a fun test to run. Clearly it was stupid. It was not meant to offend anyone and we are adding credit where due. (We'll take it down if DHH insists!) Our new designer will take a crack at more than our homepage... we need all our UI "designed".. not redesigned, but designed - because we're primarily backend guys. Yes, this landing page variation was heavily inspired (read: blatantly ripped off) from Highrise -- because these are the peeps we aspire to, and they've done a lot of testing to figure out what works: http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2991-behind-the-scenes-ab-testing-part-3-final http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2991-behind-the-scenes-ab-tes... We're running a "ghetto test" - this homepage variant does not even share a common CSS file with the rest of the code base. It's been live less than a week. The idea was to just see how the conversion characteristics were before investing a lot of time into making a "real design" out of the lessons (prominent testimonial, light copy focused on value props). Hence the hot linking, inline styles, etc. It is personally my fault for not including a credit to Highrise for the design.. that credit is well deserved and will be added shortly - a big oversight on my part.. we launch some stuff fast (other things deliberately), and this was one of those fast things. Lesson to us: add credits, and be more explicit what we're testing... ask permission instead of asking for forgiveness. In the meantime, please forgive us? :)
- jcampbell1 15y agoThanks for that. Now I am far less sad about stealing Curebit's concept. Their idea is fantastic, but I found it easier to just copy the concept than integrate with their APIs. Does anyone else find it strange that the article claims they have 1000 customers, and minimum pricing of $50/month, but they raised $1.2M? Why bother raising money if you are already close to a run-rate of $1M? My guess is they have closer to 1000 signups, not active 1000 customers.
- mp3jeep01 15y agoI doubt very many people find it strange -- just because you have revenue, or are profitable, does not mean you're "in the clear". Companies typically raise additional capital so they can accelerate their growth. Your assumption that companies only raise because they aren't cash-flow positive is misguided.
- jcampbell1 15y agoThat wasn't my assumption. It is the scale that I find strange. If the company is pulling in $100k/month, then having $1M in the bank is not going to significantly change what you can accomplish, but the effort required to raise the money is a substantial distraction.
- redguava 15y agoRevenue is not the same as profit, they could very easily be running at a loss even with that amount of revenue. We have seen this in extremes with companies like Groupon lately.
- dkrich 15y agoBy their founder's own admission, they have three employees. Not sure what they're doing that would burn through that much cash. Either their business model is severely lacking, or their spending is out of control. Of course it is possible that they aren't making any money.
- d8niel 15y agoGreat job guys!
- buddhamagnet 15y agoHow lame is that. Jesus it's not hard to come up with your own design. Crackers.
- freejack 15y agoI was super excited to see the data presented and understand its implications for my business and then when I read the comments on YC and TC, all that washed away as I realized that the credibility of the data was probably about as good as the credibility of the designers... Initially, I was excited to check them out because their referral rates look a lot better than mine. Then as I paused to consider what was really going on, brought on by the design controversy, I realize that there was a strong likelihood that these rates couldn't be all that solid because as an MVP, their sample size is probably immaterially small. I wouldn't say that I'm writing Curebit off, but it will be a while before I'm excited about them again...
- sachingulaya 15y agoIt's pretty amazing that you guys would do something so stupid and post it here to HN.
- pmin 15y agoCongrats!!!
- alexwolfe 15y agoThis is really upsetting for so many reasons. The intent to use these site designs took time and effort to implement. There had to be hours of time that they knew without a doubt they were stealing work they did not produce. To feign ignorance in this case in unacceptable. Furthermore these guys have raised 1.2 million dollars. To think that someone in this position would raise that amount in capital and pull this kind of bullshit is offensive. This is a black eye for the valley.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- logicman 15y agoVery immature!
- earbitscom 15y agoServing the assets was a big mistake, but isn't this the same forum that overwhelmingly says copying isn't stealing and that no harm is done to the original creator when you duplicate their work? Now, suddenly everyone's a hard ass about IP? In this case more than all the others argued here, if you exclude the assets problem, there was zero detriment caused by using this design. It's not a competing product, and it did nothing to the value of the original work. If you can write off the assets issue as a bad mistake, and it was, I just don't see how 99% of the HN crowd can suddenly take the high road on appropriation of creative work. Have some consistency.
- redguava 15y agoI think there is a difference about being inspired by ideas or concepts in a design and plain ripping it off completely. That for me is the big difference. As for no harm done, I don't agree with that. A lot of 37signals audience and marketing is through their audience that loves to hear what they say about design amongst other things. Having a cutting edge marketing website and blogging about it helps to generate interest in what they do. For someone that didn't know 37signals is the original designer of that style of site, no credit would go to them. The guy from Curebit even stated that he was planning to write up a blog about how the testing goes... why should they get the credit and pageviews for reviewing the a/b testing on someones elses design? Go read @allangrant recent twitter posts and see if you still feel sympathetic.
- potater 15y agoSure, people argue on the semantics of IP infringement and while many feel that intellectual property laws are woefully one sided, most of what I've seen suggests that at least a fair number of people feel that copying material in contrary to the creator's wishes is wrong. Do some folks do it anyway? No doubt. Regardless, I think much of the hard assedness has been in response to the media companies and lawmaker's approaches in addressing the issue--- poor legislation that overreaches, failure to address the actual issues that leads to piracy, copyright length extension, circumvention provisions & fair use implications, etc. In the end, I can be against efforts like SOPA while also being against ip infringement. Similarly, I would assert that it is not inconsistent to feel that curebit's approach to publicly using another other company's design w/o permission directly in their commercial product is unfortunate while also feeling like IP in the US needs to be retooled. Ultimately though, this forum compromises many viewpoints. While there will be trends, consistency when dealing with large numbers of folks seems unrealistic (but again, I don't think having issues with contemporary IP law and being against using another site's design in a commercial product demonstrates a consistency issue. It's more of a "dude, not cool" thing to me.). In regard to the lack of detriment, certainly at least one representative of 37Signals is unhappy with it. If it were my design, I'd prefer that my efforts remain tied solely to my products given the time and money spent on them since I think there is marketing and branding value in developing a reasonably unique look and feel even if the products themselves are not direct competitors. Do I recognize that designs will inspire other designs? Certainly. The line between a copied design and inspired one is blurry. Would I personally give more leeway to someone who was just experimenting for a non-commercial, personal project? Probably. This, however, was a commercial entity that just received a big check for their (and 37signals') efforts. That said, if I were an employee of curebit, I'd probably have felt uncomfortable with the approach they took regardless of any legal implications that may exist. It would just kinda feel wrong, ya know? Anyway, my initial reaction was along the lines of "well, that was stupid of them" and progressed to "WTF is wrong with this guy?" due to Allan's tweets in response to dhh. Some of his tweets have almost felt like he was trolling for controversy/publicity. Regardless, I really think he should simply stop tweeting at this point and let further public responses come from someone better equipped to NOT dig themselves deeper.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- ngsayjoe 15y agoJust subscribed to Curebit $50 / Month plan ... it seems like the product i've been waiting for all ...
- ngsayjoe 15y agoHey, guys i really like your product ... but i think you could spend your newly found venture fund to invest on a good designer. (PS: Even your email template is exact ripoff from Groupon ... i think you guys can do better than this.) (Suggestion: Could you please add "Contacts" connector on top of your email widget ... now i have to type in emails one by one for inviting friends)
- startupfounder 15y ago"And it was the same way with design. I was totally psyched to copy a Müller-Brockmann poster, a Designgraphik composition, or an Apple UI. Merely executing the copy was a thrill. But now every design is supposed to be the next great thing. And as days and weeks and months go by, the design level stays the same while the aspiration goes higher and higher. So maybe it’s time to take one of these Fridays off and just copy something." (http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2412-how-do-you-turn-inspiration-into-skill http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2412-how-do-you-turn-inspirat...)
- AznHisoka 15y agoJust visited CureBit.. Hmm I think your landing page needs some work. The typography looks a little amateurish (get your customers to refer your friends). The product looks intriguing though. Just fix your landing page because it probably will turn off a lot of customers.