http://www.techcrunch.com/2006.....pologizes/

I don’t know about you, but in my group of friends I was always the organizer whenever we had any sort of get together, which we have often. Getting a group together for something simple like a dinner can hardly be called trivial unless you really enjoy wasting loads of time on back and forth calls or emails. And if you’re planning a trip, forget about it. Try doing that over phone or email, you’ll go nuts!

what makes you think any of these services require you to sign up? Planypus, for example sends all the invitation info to the person in an email and they can rsvp by clicking any of the links in the email. they never have to sign up….

the inventors of smtp were well ahead of the web - they created these things called cc and bcc

Planypus is targeted towards people with medium to large sized social circles, especially in urban settings. What happens for people like ourselves who have social groups of 20-25…we want to have dinner on friday night with a couple of people. I’m not going to sit there and call 20 people just to see who’s available, nor am I going to waste my workday trying to figure out where we’re going to eat. Instead I send out a Planypus and let all my friends suggest places to go. By the time they’ve figured it out, I haven’t lifted a finger and I have a group of 10 people ready to go out to dinner.

Sure you can do it over the phone, but it’s going to take you at least half an hour for back and forth conversation. I don’t think it’s feasible for a group of 10 even for casual things. Planypus works well for groups of 3 and up when you need to figure out where and when you’re going, especially if you have an idea but don’t want to be the one in charge of organizing the outing.

I agree with half of your comment.

No, I don’t need the internet to have drinks with a couple friends after work.

But these guys are doing parties. If you’re inviting 35 people to a party at your house, you might want to send them something nicer than an email … and you might want to be able to track RSVP’s in one place rather than having to sort through your inbox for replies. I’ll give it a try ….

or i can try the renkoo (which means?) model…

message: “hey folks, go sign up for a renkoo account so we can IM each other about meeting for drinks”

response: “can i just say yes now and not sign up for some frigging renkoo account??”

back:”no! do not say yes or no now! we must only say yes or no through the renkoo tools!”

????

hey i wanted to write a note to myself to change a lightbulb. i see there is a new site - “notesforbulbs.com”…lots of good seed funders, former google and yahoo people. lightbulbs are a HUUUUUUUGEEEEEE business, this is soooooo monetizable. but wait! there is a new ajaxified competitor - “teslanotes” that offers some cool community features for the nascent community of people who need to change lightbulbs at pretty much the same time. we talk, we synergize, WE CHANGE THE WORLD. i am looking for a major shakeout between notesforbulbs and teslanotes.

MyPunchbowl, an event planning assistance site, officially launched today (January 15, 2006) to offer a simple way to pull together an at-home party or event. MyPunchbowl offers online assistance throughout the entire event planning life-cycle. MyPunch…

(no basements, no main street)

We expect to be live by February but below are some sample invitations that demonstrate our concept. Highlights are the free placement, choice and sizing of photos, text and graphics…you are no longer confined to a set of prefabricated invitation templates!

http://www.koolvite.com/getEve.....075a0300fb

http://www.koolvite.com/getEve.....a5840100de

http://www.koolvite.com/getEve.....c470090098

Your feedback will be much appreciated.

-Vandana

http://blogs.ibibo.com/TechnicalJournal

Evite has a ton of mindshare. Trying to compete with it is a problem of marketing more than technology. Many competitors are coming out with ajaxy goodness but I think it took this long because it is only now very affordable to build a competing product (technology-wise) so that more money can be spent on trying to dethrone the giant through marketing.

I have a feeling that those that try to compete directly with evite may lose out because it’s a hard sell to someone who uses evite and knows it well to switch. I know many people who are very non-savvy web users who use evite. Getting them to switch is tough. Although techcrunch can drive a lot of traffic to your site, you find it’s people who are just curious new-technology enthusiasts, not real users. Of course only time will tell. Good luck punchbowlers