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December 5, 2006

SimplyHeadlines Is About Five Years Too Late

Natali Del Conte

90 comments »

A company called SimplyHeadlines launched today, calling itself a news service “for the extremely busy.” It is a customizable news summary delivered to your email with headlines and summary blurbs only.

SimplyHeadlines features news from thousands of online news sources such as The New York Times, iVillage, Men’s Health, Bloomberg, and BBC, but it also allows users to order up non-news related information such as weather, stock quotes, comics, etc.

Why do we need this? Do people have a hard time finding their news online? I think this is pretty backwards thinking in this day and age for many, many reasons.

For one, last time I checked, you could get all of this information on any customizable start page. And email doesn’t have the stronghold as the most preferred method of communication that it once did. Studies show that the younger generation is far less likely to communicate via email than any other method of communication.

Additionally, I don’t think people want to be spoon fed their news anymore. That’s why sites such as Digg and Slashdot are so popular. Users want to interact with their news, decide for themselves what is important, and let their opinions about the news be heard.

Also, there is no RSS feeder for your preferred news, and, as far as I can tell, there are no blogs serving up news to SimplyHeadlines. What year is this again!? I’d rather use Spokeo, the site I reviewed last week, than this antiquated email service. Maybe this would have been revolutionary five or ten years ago but in the year 2006 it just kind of puzzles me.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 5th, 2006 at 9:12 am and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  1. SimplyHeadlines « Technically Speaking

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:43 am

  2. Anonymous

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:20 pm

  3. TechCrunch Japanese アーカイブ » SimplyHeadlines、5年ほど時代に遅れをとっている

    December 5th, 2006 at 1:03 pm

  4. SimplyHeadlines: Customized NewsPaper » Dee’s-Planet! Blog

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:22 pm

  5. My Entrepreneurship, Self-Improvement and Business Blog » Techcrunch Savages New Start-up Company

    December 5th, 2006 at 6:30 pm

  6. TechBlog

    December 5th, 2006 at 8:45 pm

  7. Ken Leebow’s Business Card . . . . . . for the 21st Century :: Online Consumption of News :: December :: 2006

    December 6th, 2006 at 4:46 am

  8. ltxfqvuuz

    December 8th, 2006 at 3:02 am

Comments

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  1. NeoTechie

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:14 am

    Have they heard of Google Alert?

  2. Sean

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:26 am

    TechCrunch should focus its efforts on companies with new and innovative/cool ideas. Ya know, like the good ol’ days!

    I don’t come to TC to read about companies with crappy products that are boring and “5 years too late”. There are a billion other companies that would kill to be featured on your front page, so it annoys me to see you give free press to services like this that no one cares about, yourself included.

  3. j.d.a.

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:28 am

    Sean’s right, we all know how many companies want to be on TechCrunch so why feature one that you think sucks?

  4. david8

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:29 am

    Yup. Coming soon to a techcrunch deadpool near you.

  5. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:35 am

    READ IT. Dumbasses. It says here

    calling itself a news service “for the extremely busy.” It is a customizable news summary delivered to your email with headlines and summary blurbs only

    The Authors Retort IS

    Why do we need this? Do people have a hard time finding their news online? I think this is pretty backwards thinking in this day and age for many, many reasons.

    Jesus Christ

  6. Fashion Industry Ceo

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:36 am

    Garbage…..a waste of bandwidth

  7. Amit

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:37 am

    Ouch.

  8. Email

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:42 am

    It’s sounds like The Week but you get to customize it more. Personally I’d rather just get The Week and not have to spend time setting something up.

  9. rr

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:52 am

    I’ve found techcrunch’s ability to apply reasoned, nuanced criticism to web 2.0 is inversely proportional to the total number of writers on the TC staff.

  10. as

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:58 am

    hey elitists,

    admittedly, i would probably not give this site much of a chance myself and it should not have been featured on techcrunch, but come on. get out of your bubble and read some stats. how many rss readers are out there vs. people with email. how many people still read a newspaper, even online, vs. going to digg/reddit? there are tens of millions of people who if you said to them the names digg, spokeo, or any other company name missing a vowel they would have no clue what the hell you are talking about. there is a certain demographic who will probably appreciate a service like this and just because they are likely outside silicon valley doesn’t mean it’s shit.

  11. tomorrow

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:59 am

    doesn’t matter. natali is hot. she can write and post whatever fills her fancy.

  12. Chnubis

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:03 am

    Sounds like TC needs a sister blog dedicated to covering deadpool companies/betas. Maybe call it CrapCrunch!

  13. sam

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:04 am

    natali….

    amazing… like any other generation. if the biz doesn’t have the hip/current terms/jargon.. it’s not releavant…

    yeah.. ok.. whatever.

    personally, i prefer to get my ‘news’/facts from someone that has a bit of credibility, not from some ‘digged’ item, that may or may not be of substance.

    slashdot, yeah, it works, but the targeted audience was/is rather technical, and can quickly determine if somethings bogus, and to promote what’s reasonable. also if i recall, slashdot has a bit of editorial flavor…

    your being in love with the latest/greatest is a function of where we are. which i think is rather interesting as someone recently stated that the avg blog has a readership of one!!!

    remember, just because something’s newer, doesn’t mean better..

    peace out…

    later

  14. anonymouse

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:07 am

    this is not a “company”. it’s a hobby project. I’ll give ‘em a couple of points for trying to hype up a mostly empty concept though.

  15. CPots

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:17 am

    Why are you writing about this joke of a site? Is this a viral experiment?

  16. carl rahn griffith

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:19 am

    seems like the portal approach is generally being questioned - http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog.....&p=717 - as per my comments in link regarding the excellent article by ‘a vc in nyc’ regards yahoo’s ills.

    is it the approach/execution or rather the terminology that now seems passe?

    content is all and personally i use my yahoo as my day to day portal - it suits my needs, is customisable and complements my other widgets being fed more specialised rss feeds, etc. a survey of many friends/associates/family for my recent business plan also shows a preference to a portal UI - for now - not everyone out there is a rss bunny or a pseudo day-trader.

    but, i have to agree that this particular service seems something of a non-event.

  17. Kevin

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:19 am

    If it is a viral experiment then I think we can all agree that it is a sucess based on the number of comments. I wonder how many people who have commented have visited the site? just to take a quick peek…

  18. Owen

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:23 am

    Wow.

    Got to join the bandwagon here, Michael - how about a little less shoot-from-the-hip from your people and a little more thought about the business.

    Yes - most of your readers won’t like it or care. But SimplyHeadlines won’t care that you say that either. As a previous commenter pointed out - this is a convenience for people who don’t have time to learn about RSS and set up a reader.

    And, in fact, I don’t see any evidence that RSS is taking off at ALL as an end user technology - sure it’s great for passing headlines around from site to site to site to site (and really great for spam blogs that don’t want to CREATE any content) - but ordinary people with real business to conduct? Here’s a real newsflash - they do NOT use RSS - but they do use email.

    The real reason Simply Headlines will fail is far more subtle - and it is the SAME reason that people in the large aren’t taking up RSS - automatic syndication is a pile of crap.

    People go to the their local major paper, NYT, Yahoo and MSN - even AOL - for news. NOT Google news, not RSS - and they do that because real people sift the news for them - every day or every hour - intelligently.

    Simply Headlines is just piling the headlines from too many sources up in one place. If you care about news at all you already have your one, two or three main daily quickies set. Simply headlines just adds more noise to the signal. If you don’t care about news you won’t read it often anyway.

    But to say that it is old school because of the way they do it is just wrong. In fact SimplyHeadlines is better than all the other aggregation methods because it is easy and straightforward - the only thing worng with it is the aggregation.

    Back to my first point - the analysis and the ’speed of coverage’ we are seeing here is a far cry from what it was six months ago. For example Simply Headlines has been around for months - I forget how long ago it was that I tried it out but it was at about 3 months.

  19. bubbatex

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:27 am

    Finding “relevant” news this day and time is a bitch, IMO. Frankly, you have to wade through a bunch of crap - even on digg. And yes, just because digg exists and gets pretty good eyeballs, does not mean it is the end-all for news. Getting news and getting relevant news are two different things, IMO.

  20. Manu de K

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:42 am

    SimplyHeadlines is far from being 5 years too late.

    In big cities such as NY, Paris, London, etc. tons of free, ad-sponsored newspapers are being distributed on the streets every day.

    Busy, trendy people with real lifes are getting addicted to be able to pick up these free zines and even adopt them over mainstream press; they’re a quick read and contains all you need to know in a single, easy format.

    Now, if SH has a way to let the user easily define what kind of info he precisely wants in his daily remedy, and 2° spits out a suitable format to let him print that out, email or PDF or whatever..

    It’s all in the content and user experience, not in RSS or web2.0 compliancy. Make no mistake..

    The biz model is there, now let’s see the execution. I’ll keep an eye on them.

  21. nick

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:43 am

    Dude(tte), this is about the lamest post I’ve ever seen on TechCrunch! A product that looks bad, sounds worse and is out of date. Sorry for repeating Sean and J.D.A’s comments, but come on - TC is suposed to be at the steaming edge of fresh web2.0 bull - not chewing yesterdays cud.

  22. Ramki

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:43 am

    I feel that this has a future. But, will have to be marketed very differently. Their focus shouldn’t be the markets in US and Europe but in developing countries where the access is still predominantly thru’ dialup and checking and downloading emails is one of the most important activities. For these people a service like this can work.
    This is similar to what RSS feedreaders (desktop based) do. You download feeds and here you get the headlines from news sites on mail. I don’t see a big difference between these two applications. But, if you have broadband access, then this becomes redundant. You can get alerts and also feeds on a more regular basis.
    And these guys are providing services for the mobile also. This might prove to be useful. This service might be late, but it can still work with some innovative marketing and targeting.

  23. Andrew

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:44 am

    Why does this deserve time on TC? I’m all in favor of TC bashing a site if its going a lot of hype elsewhere and thus is newsworthy (like PPP), but both this site and this post are a waste of time. No point in TC picking on an obscure RSS mashup that no one has heard of.

  24. Sean

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:47 am

    Just to be clear, my first comment (#2) wasn’t saying that I myself think this is a crappy product, but rather questioning why TC would make a post about it if they think it’s crappy and 5 years too late. Focus on what you think is COOL, not what you think SUCKS! :P

  25. Paul

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:51 am

    Wow. If you guys actually signed up and checked it out you would find out that there’s a social networking aspect to the site. It lets you share the headlines that you chose. And you can get blog content but there’s only 4 to chose from. I think that with a bit of feedback this could be an interesting product. I won’t take much to add sponsor ads into the emails that people ready everyday. There are a lot of newsletters on the net to sign up for, this one is just more customizable. Good luck to them.

  26. nick

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:53 am

    to post#20 - Free sheet papers are only consumed in metropolitan areas because they are a) free - as you identified and b) can be read on the underground, bus etc. they also have huge distribution arms - i.e loads of guys forcing you to take a copy at every station and intersection.

  27. Paul

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:54 am

    Wow. You guys are just jealous that they didn’t write about YOUR crappy project. Haha. It’s great to discuss bad examples to see what not to do. I bet there’s at least 10 people that canceled their business plan after reading this post.

  28. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:56 am

    I am an angry piece of shit. Sorry, I will no longer post on TC.

  29. Denver Wang

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:59 am

    Thanks for making this so damn easy!
    Mark - 72 year-old cyberpunk

    5 years ago, I and some friends used to talk about this kind of service especially for doctors, and deliver it to their palm or handheld device, but it seems doesn’t work.

    Now, we got blackberry, and all kinds of handy terminal, but they send it only via email? unbelievable!!! But maybe helpful to Mark, some 70 years old grandpa or grandma, who only knows how to read the email. As matter as fact, my mom even chat with me via msn…. I still remember a month before, I old man dead, his wife posted an video online…..also a grandma…

    http://www.ezecho.com

  30. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:59 am

    Unbelievable. Guys grow up.

    This site has a Social Networking side.

    Mike has always posted things he thought are going to flop. Stop ranting here. jesus

    Its always the same ppl too. Its getting kinda of annoying. Go to work instead of wasting your employers money.

  31. Jeff

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:08 am

    Long time listener… first time caller…

    I am constantly amazed by the enthusiastic criticism by the navel-gazers on this blog. SH looks like a lovely service for someone who’d like their news highlights delivered to their inbox for a quick scan and/or printing. Full Stop. I don’t care for it personally, but my Dad? He uses and loves it. And maybe it’ll be handy for a quick glance at the news on my Crackberry. Dunno yet.

    As for the editorial mission and quality of TechCrunch? C’mon people. You get what you pay for. GigaOm and 50 other wannabe sites are what… 10 keystrokes away?

  32. Manu de K

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:08 am

    To post#26 - Yep, you’re spot on..

    Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to read a free sheet paper with only articles on topics you’re interested in? On the underground, on the bus, in a plane etc, without having to fire up a pc or burn your eyes away on a pda ?

    If these guys can bring in my favorite feeds in a nice to read single page, with content and images, then I’m in. But in the meantime I agree that they should market their solution somewhat differently.

  33. kip

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:21 am

    mmH
    techcrap…..may be to those who suggest it,.
    old tec..is hi gear this sides.

  34. Cosmin

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:21 am

    –
    TC

    This has to be the best negative press I’ve seen or heard so far… and the replies confirm it. :)

    Entertaining Article!

  35. Laurent

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:29 am

    I’ve tried it and it rocks. I even got a new friend, Josh (the creator of SimplyHealines). I like receiving an email once a day at the time of my choosing. And I loved their special feature “keyword” that allows you to get news talking about specific things, even coming from blogs. Simple, great, useful.

  36. Jon

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:34 am

    “Users want to interact with their news, decide for themselves what is important, and let their opinions about the news be heard.”

    Really? That’s what people want to do? Interact with their news?

  37. KushCash

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:36 am

    Please tell me that you hate my site too so more people will visit it! :)

  38. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:39 am

    I apologize again. I said I wouldn’t post another comment. Jesus! I’m just going to do us all a favor and shut up.

  39. anonymouse

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:41 am

    “Users want to interact with their news, decide for themselves what is important, and let their opinions about the news be heard.”

    #36: no, that’s what “web 2.0 entrepreneurs” think people want to do. as long as they can tag and share and socially network, they will flock to it, because most people with disposable income have nothing better to do.

    as for me, I like news being spoon-fed to me. except reading the news is so trivially simple that I have no use for something like SH, and if I did, I wouldn’t pay a cent for it, because programming a clone would take any decent web developer a weekend. once again, hobby project, not a business.

  40. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:43 am

    Funny whoever did that @38 =P

  41. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:45 am

    Mike, do you need more writers?

    I write a crappy blog here:

    http://blog.franc-design.com/

    I want to work with Natali cause she’s smokin’ hot!

    We can drink our morning coffee together.

  42. Adrian Keys

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:47 am

    SimplyHeadlines.com (for those close to the Domaining world) rings through: For one, Headlines.com would have been prime because of the type-in factor but that must have been taken and would warrant significant bucks to wrestle away.

    On the other hand…SimplyHeadlines.com follows the existing trend of using longer keyword type domains.

    Either good idea for those on the go.

    http://www.revafinancial.squarespace.com

  43. Bill

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:48 am

    Hi. My name is Bill Strong and I am one of the THREE employees at SimplyHeadlines. I appreciate the commentary on TechCrunch regarding our service. Just to be very clear with everyone, this is not a product for the tech enlightened. SimplyHeadlines was created to provide business professionals, non-technology minded folks, and people on-the-go with a customizable newspaper delivered to their email inbox or mobile device on a daily basis.

    We built SimplyHeadlines to address a perceived need for those who don’t have time to or don’t care to understand what an RSS feed is, what an RSS feed does, and/or how an RSS feed works - that’s exactly why there is little mention of RSS on our site. This need has actually been proven to us over the last year and a half as we have steadily built an active subscriber base with high open rates, low unsubscribe rates, and high join rates - all metrics that encourage us that our product is being perceived well by our target market.

    We encourage you to give the product a try since you can unsubscribe at any time. Please email me directly at bill@simplyheadlines.com with any product comments you may have or continue to post on TechCrunch. Most of our product enhancements such as keyword news clipping, stock quotes, weather, gmail email notification, etc. are the result of comments directly from our current subscribers or the from the technology community in general.

    Bill Strong
    SimplyHeadlines

  44. Frank Cefalu

    December 5th, 2006 at 11:55 am

    Bill,

    Your product is good but as previous comments, why choose your product over Live.com, or Google Desktop. Any of these products can replicate multiple feeds coming to you directly.

    Whats unique about Simply Headlines? What new spin do you have?

  45. rr

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:05 pm

    My point about nuanced criticism wasn’t, itself, nuanced. The issue isn’t that Natali shouldn’t have written about the site, but that she should spend less time worrying about jargon/rss/etc and more time thinking and blogging about the number of sites on the web that have horrible UI and a 5-year-old concept and yet are raking it in.

  46. Andrew Hallock

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:16 pm

    He just mentioned why people would choose his product over Live.com, Google Desktop, et al: it’s for people who don’t give a damn what RSS is. Personally, I love RSS and would not use this service, but most people I know have never heard of RSS, feeds, REST, etc. It won’t always be that way, but these guys saw a demand and are trying to capitalize - sounds good to me.

  47. Bill Minton

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:30 pm

    I don’t know…I gave it a whirl. I’ll see what’s produced. One thing for the tech crowd would be if you work for an employer that strictly limits net access. However, for those individuals, more than one email per day would be beneficial.

  48. Dwight Silverman

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:44 pm

    I’ve been using the SimplyHeadlines as beta for several months. My initial thought upon signing up for it was, “Eh, this is e-mail news, I won’t use it.” But that’s not been the case. I’ve really enjoyed it, using it as an index page for further exploration in my RSS feeds.

    I’ve got it set to come in about 6a CST, which is when I start the surfing process for my blog. I go through its summaries, then use that focus on more indepth discovery in my feeds. I’d say it cuts down my poking/prodding by at least 15 minutes.

    My wife, who is very much a non-techie, also subscribed just for straight news, and she has become hooked on it. There are little things about it that make it appealing, from its quirky “Fact of the day” (they’re hilarious, and I think I saw Letterman steal one from it the other night), to its simple layout and easy customizability.

    Also, Natali writes: “Also, there is no RSS feeder for your preferred news, and, as far as I can tell, there are no blogs serving up news to SimplyHeadlines”…. Actually, the whole THING is an RSS reader. You can indeed enter and RSS feed or an OPML file into it — so any blog or news source can contribute to SimplyHeadlines.

    A suggestion for Natali: Subscribe to SimplyHeadlines and give it a try for a month. I bet you end up using it in ways you didn’t think you would. I know it surprised me. I started out dismissing it, and now I’m a fan.

  49. Startups.in/India

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:53 pm

    #44…read here how they are different - http://www.simplyheadlines.com/different.aspx

  50. Jason

    December 5th, 2006 at 12:54 pm

    1) I’m not thrilled that TechCrunch is reporting on a topic that they consider to be years behind today’s industry. Maybe I’ll start buying a Washington Post for my news on technology.

    2) Even though the web site featured in this post is behind in the technology “fancy” aspect [ajax, etc.], it very well may be successful. I commend the programmer(s) and developers of the site to endeavor into the world of web site business. Especially since it’s a news related site….very hard market to get into and stay alive. Maybe they’ll make it, maybe they won’t….I look forward to seeing how to turns out.

    Just for the sake of trying the new site, I’m bookmarking the new site and will try it for a few weeks to see how it is. (note: I am NOT related nor involved with the site mentioned above. I simply like encouraging Internet endeavors, and wish to show my support to anyone that tries to make a dream happen.)

    -J

  51. rui jorge

    December 5th, 2006 at 1:09 pm

    you may not believe in this comment, but it’s true. about iphone: The second gen iphone will have wibree and wibree headphones, so you can hear music not-wired. 1st gen iphone only bluetooth. 1st gen iphone 4g version no cam, 8 gb version 2 mpx cam. 1st gen iphone no hard buttons (like motorola). Big screen, thin body (ipod nano like, but with a bigger screen). Mp3 second battery can be used for phone if the first one runs out (this is an option). Cool interface, zooming in and out menus (like zune, but more apple style). Easy sync with mac os (calendar, contacts, itunes, photos, vid.)

    source: an apple trusted source (not me, he just told me this)

  52. Vik

    December 5th, 2006 at 1:13 pm

    “Additionally, I don’t think people want to be spoon fed their news anymore. That’s why sites such as Digg and Slashdot are so popular. ”

    I cannot disagree with you more. You think users of Digg and Slashdot represent the “people”? I’m a busy professional and I do not have the time to surf around on the Internet and decide what is important to me. Yes, I want to be spoon fed my news just so I can keep up with the current events.

  53. Dave

    December 5th, 2006 at 1:24 pm

    I think this is better than reading a love affair about another photo sharing site/music sharing site/social networking site. Even though they have not adopted the coveted 36 trebuchet font, tag cloud and reflective logo - I think the idea is simple and the market is real…these are usually two (of many) key ingredients. I hope they do well - and thanks for letting us know about it.

  54. Peter

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:02 pm

    if their target audience is 30+ years old, then this is absolutely necessary. it’s taken me three months of rss feed reading, google searching, analysing, aggregating, sorting, arranging and filtering, and years of computer expertise to finally be getting a decent account of the daily news.

    it’ll take me another few months to make my news gathering ‘good’ - and then it’ll still be crap because it’ll be coming into a feed reader as several hundred feeds, all with different social-networking-based user rankings, different topics with different emphasis with no coherent strategy for helping me deduce quickly what are the most important topics of the day. the news is a complete mess. the news continues to change. we now have more and better access to the best news feeds in the world - from al Jazeera, for instance. people need help getting something digestable, yet still comprehensive.

    more websites/services like this, please.

  55. Michael McCorry

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:21 pm

    Agree with #53 and #54.

    Those complaining that its not RSSy or tag-cloudy enough, you are not the target audience. Not everyone knows about feed-readers/RSS (nor wants to know). They just want their news.

    I actually like this sort of post. What’s the good of a reviews site that only posts glowing, positive reviews. Not only does it put everyone on a level playing field (from VC-funded start-ups, to multi-nationals, to spare-time hobbiests), but the exposure also provides valuable feedback to help these new projects improve their services (well, it would if more people look at the service objectively rather than accuse TC of barrel-scraping).

  56. Patricia

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:28 pm

    I think people who are in tech sometimes have a hard time remembering that most people are not. It means we all either overestimate or underestimate the user - I do it all the time myself and I’m pretty tapped into the average joe online and what they respond to. The bottom line is that ALOT of people - probably the majority - are just starting to cut their teeth on really making the web personalized for them - my dad doesn’t even know that Google has a news page. My mom just got high speed internet. These are all people who make up a demographic others can tap into, right? I’m pretty tech and I hit Google News daily - I knew about Google Alerts but never knew I could have it send me all of the news I want to read from the media I want to read it with, in a single email every morning. Awesome!

    I think this idea could have legs but it’s not going to be an easy road, for the obvious reasons noted in the article.

  57. Bill

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:31 pm

    # 48

    Hi Dwight:

    I appreciate your comments regarding SimplyHeadlines. It’s funny, your experience with the product is probably the most common piece of feedback that we have received from our subscriber base over the past year and a half. At first they aren’t sure about the product or how it will really benefit them but they give it a shot. After a week or so they realize that they like having their news sent to them in a simple format on a daily basis and that it actually helps them stay up to date on the things that they care about.

    Of course, I realize that there are a ton of different ways people can get their news, including television, newspapers, radios and the hundreds if not thousands of online sources. So, I understand that SimplyHeadlines isn’t for everyone.

    Thanks again and we are very happy to hear that you are enjoying the service. It’s what keeps us going.

    Bill Strong
    SimplyHeadlines

  58. Sean

    December 5th, 2006 at 2:59 pm

    To everyone who is saying that we (TC readers) are not the target market for this service, I agree with that statement, but here’s a question. Why is this posted on TC if TC readers are not the target market? Especially if TC thinks this is stupid, why do they post it? (See my previous comment #2).

    Are they just F-ing with our heads? :)

  59. again

    December 5th, 2006 at 3:22 pm

    http://redeye.firstround.com/2006/05/53651.html

  60. elvirs

    December 5th, 2006 at 3:25 pm

    i think the idea behind the service is very good.
    digg and slashdot is for masses, these diggers spend their days on submitting news then commenting on them then commenting on their comments and this continues till the digger has to get up from computer.
    but this is for the ppl who dont have hours to be spent on digg or slashdot but want fresh news delivered to them. this will work.
    and when you review sth please try to be objective and less push your point of view to the front.

  61. Phil Sellers

    December 5th, 2006 at 3:35 pm

    Only thing worse than NOT being featured on TC is being trotted out and slammed on TC.

    Not good form. A lose-lose-lose situation.

  62. Patricia

    December 5th, 2006 at 4:12 pm

    @ Phil, you haven’t been around for any of the PayPerPost drama then :)

  63. Cyrus

    December 5th, 2006 at 4:31 pm

    Polarization = Good

  64. David Mackey

    December 5th, 2006 at 5:33 pm

    News summaries can be nice, but I agree, I don’t think this can fly. Digg already gives summaries.

  65. aminaglia at technologypr.com

    December 5th, 2006 at 5:53 pm

    Natali,

    Thank you for report on SimplyHeadlines. Actually, you CAN choose to - add personal favorite news sources - from http://www.simplyheadlines.com.....ws> either choose or scroll to bottom where you can Add News Sources). Keep in mind however that SimplyHeadlines’ has met demand for a customizable service without the need for the user to get into RSS if they choose not to. Also, like you, many SimplyHeadlines users see the similarities to startpages and instead of MyYahoo or NetVibes etc. have chosen SimplyHeadlines because it arrives in their email in-boxes when they’re on-the-go. In fact, I read my personalized/customized SimplyHeadlines email newspaper this morning (customized to include my favorite news sources, and blogs) from my Treo while I was heading into the city. We appreciate the constructive feedback, all of which goes into SimplyHeadlines ongoing development efforts and makes this an everyday, simple and efficient tech tool. Your readers can read more about the product at http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/061204......html?.v=1.

    Best,

    Alison Minaglia
    President
    TechnologyPR.com for SimplyHeadlines
    aminaglia at technologypr.com

  66. Nemrut

    December 5th, 2006 at 7:43 pm

    Natali– despite your somewhat myopic viewpoints, it’s good that you covered this story as the service has a lot of potential.

    Many Crunchers/Crunchettes forget that sometimes the most elegant solutions/services dont require the most high tech implementation. You can have the best technology but if no one uses it what’s the point…

    As others have noted, this is a great alternative for those who have yet to understand RSS-which in it’s curret form is a usability nightmare. Just about everyone undertands email(ala ‘you’ve got mail!’) and providing the ‘rest of us’ with a low fidelitymethod of news aggregation can only help the adoption of RSS and other web 2.0 innovations.

    So i say keep up the coverage of new and exciting companies - even those using less than innovative tech to serve the masses (think Craigslist)..

  67. Sergio

    December 5th, 2006 at 8:25 pm

    I completely disagree with all you naysayers that bashed this article. First, not every day is filled with exciting news of red hot start-ups and dramatic executive exodi. I mean, Techcrunch can not cover hot new start-ups that do not exist. Perhaps you are actually disappointed that you did not get your daily fix of these hot start-ups? Second, I actually enjoyed this article and ones like it that explore complete flops. I don’t agree with all of Natali’s points, but I also think she wrote a very good analysis. It’s fascinating to me to see that these kinds of ‘duds’ are actually getting funding! Can anyone say ‘bubble’?

    So Natali, don’t take these fuddy-duddies too seriously. I think that you and the rest of the Techcrunch team do an excellent job covering industry news–the traffic numbers speak for themselves.

  68. BC

    December 5th, 2006 at 8:27 pm

    I subscribe to hundreds of RSS feeds. I heard about SimplyHeadlines several weeks ago and decided to give it a try. As others have said, I didn’t think it would be of much use to me. However, I find that it’s the first thing I read in the morning to grab the quick headlines.

  69. Ulf

    December 5th, 2006 at 9:42 pm

    Sean: “Why is this posted on TC if TC readers are not the target market?”

    Because many of the TC readers have a target market of their own? The website in question might just reach parts of the demographic you’re going after or offer lessons on how to reach them. Or maybe just offer another perspective on technical solutions if that’s what you’re after.

    And it seems like there’s a lot of lessons to learn here for some people. Like learning to appreciate nuance or targeted tech solutions that hide their “techiness”.

    Digg and Slashdot are fun diversions for nerds like me, but they could be dwarfed by SimplyHeadlines in no time just based on the size of their target market. Not that they are otherwise comparable (SimplyHeadlines is less of destination website and more of a service, right?).

  70. Pramit Singh

    December 5th, 2006 at 10:27 pm

    RSS is taking offe in abig way. Soon businesses will be using it for mriad other purposes. In fact, RSS will also be integrated with email, in a way that the user doesn’t have to learn much.

    MediaVidea has an article on Why RSS will rule:
    http://mediavidea.blogspot.com.....-rule.html

  71. Vondre Whaley

    December 6th, 2006 at 2:46 am

    They are writing about it because it works!

    Look how many people who have responded to this thread.

    Good Success!

    Vondre’
    http://www.askfinancialquestions.com

  72. $2 Million a Month

    December 6th, 2006 at 6:13 am

    Well I have never used Rss

    But the guys at SH are doing something with their lives .

    As long as their are people that will use the site they will be ok

    I subscribe to a service from smartbrief.com that sends me restaurant news . All it does is send me a few restaurant news headlines everyday .

    The have thousands of restaurant operators that subsribe to the news .

    It costs like $3000 for a small text ad in the email newsletter .

    Most Techies dont have any Business Acumen ..

    They can be successfull

  73. Jim Kukral

    December 6th, 2006 at 6:41 am

    It’s techmeme delivered via email. I think it’s great, smart. Nobody cares what RSS is in the “real” world people.

  74. barb dybwad

    December 6th, 2006 at 9:26 am

    since when are bloggers obligated to cover only positive news? i fail to see how this post would *not* be relevant.

    just remember, the other half of the trolls are complaining in other posts about how techcrunch is too techno-utopian and not critical enough of new startups.

  75. Rick

    December 6th, 2006 at 2:45 pm

    Along the lines of what many bright people here are saying, if I sent both this and digg.com to almost everyone I know(ie not web 2.0 intergeeks like us) they would choose simplyheadlines over digg bar-none. Best quote of this post is anonymouse’s

    —
    #36: no, that’s what “web 2.0 entrepreneurs” think people want to do. as long as they can tag and share and socially network, they will flock to it, because most people with disposable income have nothing better to do.
    —

    This is so true that it’s not even funny. I’ve been lamenting the fact that I live in a horrible place for an aspiring startup, but there’s something to be said for having your ear that close to the “pulse” of the web: the pulse is but one of many vital signs. Example: I only know one person in real life who has ever heard of flickr, and this isn’t exceptional, this is likely the norm.

    Though it couldn’t possibly be realized by the crowd who would be shocked to realize that I’ve seen many, many people still typing “search strings” into the address bar(that’s right, some people are still that oblivious), this is actually probably the only company I’ve seen on TC outside of social networking sites that could be of even remote relevance to the majority(ie barely computer literate) of internet users.

  76. Rick

    December 6th, 2006 at 2:51 pm

    And as an addenda, I wonder if this isn’t the surest sign of a looming bubble?

    When the idealistic VC’s, startup bloggers, and acquisition handlers forget that their consumers are functionally retarded and quit going for lowest common denominator products like simply headlines the bust has to be somewhere on the horizon, non?

  77. aibek

    December 6th, 2006 at 8:12 pm

    to natali; premature and inaccurate judgement

  78. Cailean

    December 7th, 2006 at 7:15 am

    A little late to the party here, but I’ve been sick in bed for three days, which means little access to my RSS reader… But my SimplyHeadlines email has arrived on schedule every morning to my bed-side blackberry. I may not have had the energy to crack open my laptop, but scanning my SimplyHeadlines email told me whether or not is was worth the effort.

  79. Phil Sellers

    December 7th, 2006 at 1:51 pm

    That silly font must make the “Web 2.0″ crowd ROF and turn into werewolves. It should be pastel green/blue, lowercase and not make any sense so it won’t be dorky. “Simply Headlines” makes waaaay too much sense for a successful name. TIC :) Maybe, “headzup” or “enooze” ?

  80. David Scott Lewis

    December 7th, 2006 at 9:34 pm

    Be careful with demographics, Natali. Although you’re absolutely correct that teens prefer SMS/MMS to e-mail, it’s also true that they still prefer e-mail to blogs. And when teens become adults, e-mail will become their preferred means of communication.

    You also have to adjust this for cultures. For example, considering income levels, there is much greater adoption of mobile phones in China (where I live). OTOH, almost nobody has voicemail for their mobile numbers. It absolutely amazes me — no v-mail. It’s available, but not part of Chinese culture. Yet, even senior execs will take a phone call at almost anytime … even when they’re giving a presentation!!

    Anyway, let’s be careful not to draw too many sweeping, American-specific conclusions.

    BTW, SMS/MMS is even more popular in China than in the States, where primitive Americans still call it “text messaging.” But there’s a reason for this, too: Pricing. Another reason: A Chinese person can pretty much write a full paragraph in the same time it takes us to type just a few words. A character-based language is perfect for SMS.

  81. Paul Irish

    December 8th, 2006 at 12:17 pm

    this is another comment from someone who thinks this post on simplyheadlines was the biggest waste of time ever.
    where is your sharp critical editorial eye?

  82. stress

    March 10th, 2007 at 4:54 pm

    i think it s a waste of time

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