Founder of Fabulis/ Fab.com blames gay rights progress for failure of his gay social network
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I love it that some individuals actually appear to believe that simply prefixing “gay” on to any existing popular concept is enough to gain a return on investment, regardless of the quality of the product.
The problem was we couldn’t see a clear path to getting to 10 million users. We could do the math to get to 1M users over time, but it would take a long time.
Grindr is the only true success story in new online gay services, and that’s because it’s about a critical need: hookups. But we didn’t want to be another hookup site at fab.
I do not believe at this point that there is legitimate demand for a non-sexual social network for gay men that would garner more than 1M members. And if you can’t get to 10M members, it’s hard to build a significant business in this space.
Grindr uses the same model: the gay networking niche. So we could expect it to throw in the towel sometime in the near future as well. But not before its owner gets to pocket a few bucks of course.
Sadly I have to agree with your assessment about Fab.com.
Grindr takes advantage of modern technologies, making it easier to hook up and more accessible, no doubt competitors will come along and in the future the business idea will start to fail as technology moves on, unless Grindr can keep up.
Lets ban being gay on Facebook so some knob can make millions!
Think it’s wrong to blame Gay Rights and putting a negative spin on it. There are so many Gay networks for people to choose it just may be a simple that this group did have anything or anything new to offer.
Oh lordy, sorry meant it may just be as simple as they didn’t have anything or anything new to offer.
If you have a good product, target your market well, work hard, you will gain success. Stop whimpering and blaming others or events for your failures ! Please….
I think what you are missing is that we’re not “blaming” gay progress, rather we are celebrating it. I couldn’t be happier that Facebook has turned out to be the best gay social network on earth. It’s awesome that more and more gay people are living their lives “out” and thus negating the need for a closed gay community.
Let’s hope that the same thing doesn’t happen to PinkNews
I think many people would still be there if there was a level playing field, no cheating and better customer serive from Goldberg and his other investors.
Blame on gay rights but it all comes down to good Customer Service and playing fair and when the owners were alerted of this several times they chose to ignore.
People would join just to get the ipods and then leave again after winning. It got to where you couldn’t get to win by friends but only lobbying and stuffing the ballot box.
Then the Mass Exodus began.
Blame yourselves Goldberg, not gay rights.
This is total betrayal — Jason Goldberg sold us out – tempted us into a social network site, built up his data base, then went totally commercial. Outrageous. BOYCOTT IT
I think that “gay progress” is clearly a big city thing. I knew a lot of people at fabulis.com (later fab.com) who lived in smallish communities. We were their only social outlet; and that was HUGE for them.
I guess I’m just a mamsy-pamsy for wanting to see a gay male social site that relies on heart-felt interaction and not hookups and one-night stands. If, as Jason implies per Grindr, that’s where the real money is to be found; maybe the answer is to stop chasing the money (or testosterone) and change the model to value relationships, friendships, and personal human interaction.
I’d like to believe that that’s not just a dream devoutly to be wished!
I think what Fab accomplished was the visible need for a segment of gay men to connect with each other on different levels than what has been offered before. Now we need to find a team of people who can take what was good from it and create a new space where gay men can network, collaborate and express themselves. The trick, I think is to approach this from a social entrepreneurship perspective – where $$ are important, but the value of the endeavor is not based solely on $$.
Poorly managed and arrogant leaders is what undid their site.
the problem with Fabulis (and then Fab) was that they tried to do way to much at once: Social Networking, Profiles, Online Auctions, Groupon-esque Deals, some ridiculous “bits” system, and the ability to rank people, which was both insulting and offensive. It seemed as if the site was schizophrenic, constantly changing it’s scope and what it was trying to accomplish.
If you ever have the “pleasure” to meet Mr. Goldberg, he is a wildly conceited man who constantly lauds how much money he has made at past ventures and how rich he has become as a result of this. I think it’s karma that came back to bite him in the ass now that Fab(ulis) has failed. Take ownership for your actions, not the gay community.
I don’t trust this newest incarnation of the site, and I can’t imagine how many more changes he will make to it over its existence.
Good luck fab.com and Mr. Goldberg…you surely need it.
I’ve heard that Jason is all about Jason– and pretty awful. But it’s obvious that he feels like he needs to make money in order to validate himself. Plus, at the end of the day a couple million dollars isn’t real money anyway so I guess he’s failed. He’s a loser.
As someone who blog a lot and spends a good amount of time using social media sites, I used both Fabulis and Fab as another way to connect with new people. What I don’t need is more sites for shopping. As a result, I have already unsubscribed.
Actually, as someone who joined Fabulis in the beginning, the reason it never took off was because the site came across as rather cheap and tacky looking, boring and with no point whatsoever…
there was nothing NEW – we have endless gay sites like gaydar and manhunt and so on, and fabulis was really rather dull and basic compared with those, and was not a patch on facebook either.
We expect MUCH more than to be offered some dodgy crap product which we ought to want to jump on just because we are gay…
The real problem is fabulis did not find a new angle, did not have a niche, and was just inadequate, and the guy who started it up just wants to blame something external for his own failure.
A great gay site would do really well… they do! Shoddy gay sites simply will not, and this is what happened.
I think everyone is missing the true point here.
The word “blame” is used incorrectly in the header of the post. Progress is not being “blamed” here, it is simply a reason (and a very good one) that the site didn’t work as originally planned.
The site was built originally to work as a social media hub for gay men. But gay men are already using all of these other main stream social media hubs, and there really wasn’t a need for it any longer.
I look at my personal facebook and it is as gay as I make it. I have a lot of gay friends, friends that do drag, friends that are gay artists, gay writers, etc. and I see that my facebook when I log in is a gay hub in it’s own.
The move onto a new venture was obviously not about abandoning the community. If nothing else Jason and the Fab team have been tremendous supporters of gay rights and gay charities. It’s just looking ahead and building something new and enjoyable for everyone that isn’t out there yet.
I think there’s a way to embrace a gay sensibility about the world around us, without just making a duplicate of something straight/mainstream. That’s what we’ve done with Gay List Daily (www.gaylistdaily.com). Our free daily email reviews aren’t always about gay things, but the point-of-view always is. That’s been a key to our success.
And when we occasionally offer deals, we do it more to help and exposure our readers to gay-owned and gay-friendly companies. It’s not just about selling lube.
Let’s make it clear shall we? The more gay culture becomes mainstream, the less gay oriented services and websites will be viable business ideas in the long term. There’s just a small time window to make a little profit, and then is time to pack or repack, knowing that this window is becoming culturally smaller by the hour.
When fab decided to move into “groupon” territory I contacted them to see if the company I work for could be involved. Unfortunately the incompetent people who work there were unable to even explain their concept or how it would work in the gay marketplace. When I balked at their half baked concept they didn’t even try to save the deal. I represent a MAJOR company and they didn’t even want to work it out and never even followed up on my emails. The problem is NOT gay rights, but a simple case of mis-management and a poorly executed business plan that had no chance of succeeding when they had no idea what they were doing.
I joined in the original recruiting but didn’t ‘get it’ because of the silly prompts that were continually sent. It wasn’t very user-friendly and appeared more like a commercial enterprise.
The point of any business, particularly internet ones is the ability to adapt. Lokk at any of the big guys now, such as Amazon, Facebook, Google etc to how they started.
Even the likes of Gaydar had to reassess or lose to other newer sites. It’s the rule of the jungle: You either evolve or die.
Harsh and bitchy comments. I wouldn’t expect anything less from gay people!
Jason is/was & always will be a self absorbed moron. He is/was & always will be a train wreck waiting to happen. Plain and simple.
Of course the label gay does not mean anything unless the product itself is right