Comments on: Four Month Old Wize Gets $4 Million

By: Wize Redesigns Product Review Search Engine | facternet:

Wize Redesigns Product Review Search Engine | facternet: — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 11:40:47 +0000

[...] a in-depth look at what people are saying about a particular product. The startup, which has raised $4 million in funding, faces competition from Retrevo, ReviewGist and [...]

By: Wize Redesigns Product Review Search Engine

Wize Redesigns Product Review Search Engine — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 11:26:34 +0000

[...] a in-depth look at what people are saying about a particular product. The startup, which has raised $4 million in funding, faces competition from Retrevo, ReviewGist and [...]

By: A Look at Supernova 2007 Connected Innovators

A Look at Supernova 2007 Connected Innovators — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 03:31:03 +0000

[...] them through an algorithm to create a single, 1-100 “WizeRank.” Earlier this year they got a $4 million round. We have a review of other review services [...]

By: Joel

Joel — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 07:24:01 +0000

Jon just wishes he had $4M for his camera collection…hehe

By: Joel

Joel — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 07:20:26 +0000

Looks like a bunch of comments from jealous wannabe entrepreneurs jealous that this site received $4M….and others “conveniently” leaving their website address in their comment. If Bessemer opens their pocket, Wize.com will be something…..something BIG!

By: AccesoBit.com » Wize después de 4 meses en línea recibe $ 4MM

AccesoBit.com » Wize después de 4 meses en línea recibe $ 4MM — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 13:10:22 +0000

[...] | Wize Vía | LifeHacker Enviar a un amigo por E-mail | TrackBack URI Categoria:Internet [...]

By: Scott

Scott — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 17:06:21 +0000

These sites are fairly similar but View score only has 11 products? Wize has hundreds. I am pretty impressed with the fact that you can find pretty much anything on this site.

By: Chris Harris

Chris Harris — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 08:16:17 +0000

I’m also looking for the typical “starutp pie chart” of expenses. I’m convinced a lt of it is consumed in hiring people – not their salaries – but the actual process of recruiting, interviewing, hiring, firing, and training people. This all happens at lightning speed in a startup – and more of them should use incubators, outsourcing companies, and contractors to help them not waste the money this way!

By: Dave

Dave — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 02:48:30 +0000

When did Viewscore’s service become available? I seem to remember Wize being available in August, 2006.

By: Enkaedu

Enkaedu — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 23:26:50 +0000

Paul,

That’s just the thinking I’m worried about. As one of those “guys with a pedigree” from a big company, I’m too well aware that nobody really has any magic. Investment money runs hot and cold, and when $4m (and more) starts chasing automated web sites with a cute name and a flash CEO, I start to worry. We’ve been to this movie before. It’s a shame. And of course it isn’t just this Wize deal alone. There has been a rash of ridiculous funding announcements in the past year. “Too much money chasing too few ideas.” When have we heard that before? I think just before Abby Cohen started dumping tech stocks in April 2000.

Even if – and I believe this – the new wave has more legs than the 90’s, the plain fact is that when VCs find themselves feeling like schmucks for dumping millions on houses-of-cards trying to win the Google lotto, they take their ball and go home.

What we ought to be seeing – particularly as most of these businesses are incredibly cheap to start and run today – is small money followed by more small money.

By: Samir

Samir — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 19:45:36 +0000

“www.viewscore.com was the first to launch this service so i agree with daniel nothing new here…”

Who cares? There were sites before you doing the same thing, I’m sure you looked to them for ideas. All of the players in this space are interesting, and I wish them all the best of luck.

By: Philip

Philip — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 18:58:56 +0000

I believe that fuzzy algorithms to determine rankings that aren’t immediately clear to the user, lose the trust factor immediately. And trust is all you got when your primary service is ratings.

Amazon SalesRank and the Tomatometer are clear metrics. There’s no voodoo, and they are therefore loved.

Alexa is in a grey area.

By: Jon

Jon — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 18:55:08 +0000

i know cameras and the best camera has a GARBAGE rating. The WORST camera has a great 100 rating. The only difference is the number of units sold. I would say they will fail based on 5 minutes of looking at the site. Simply a game of playing buzz word bingo… I would prefer to use the best shopping site out there at FROOGLE

By: Lee

Lee — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 17:19:59 +0000

Lee from Wize here — Dave G., you’re right. Although we’ve recently moved our headquarters to San Mateo, Wize was started in Minneapolis and we still have offices there. Good catch.

By: Rajeev Vashisht

Rajeev Vashisht — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 16:59:09 +0000

Its a good idea, Users create content and the companies gets paid,
There after all seems to be a difference between wisdom and knowledge.

http://blogs.ib...echnicalJournal

By: Rajeev Vashisht

Rajeev Vashisht — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 16:57:33 +0000

The user generates content and my business gets paid, cool man,
There is a difference between knowledge and wisdom.

By: Dave G.

Dave G. — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 16:15:28 +0000

@ Rick…exactly.

Michael, I thought wize was based out of Minneapolis.

By: Rick

Rick — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 15:48:18 +0000

There are a ton of non-obvious partnership opportunities for the site that does this well.

By: Paul Freet

Paul Freet — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 14:15:27 +0000

That’s actually a very reasonable amount of money for a company like this. Extremely well done site. Short, easy to remeber name. And they have a CEO who has experience from P&G – nothing like that to get a VC excited.

Looks like they mined other sites for their 1,000,000 reviews. Someone had to sit through and figure out if they were positive or negative – they must have some algorithm for doing that. That would take quite a while to do manually.

By: Kula bácsi

Kula bácsi — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 12:49:12 +0000

I’d spend the $4M on booze and hookers then ask for more.

By: Sam Newman

Sam Newman — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 12:47:34 +0000

There is a UK-based startup called Reevoo which also operates in this space. They provide trusted reviews for companies like Orange and Dixons, and recently secured $5 million in second round funding.

They are not a review aggregate – rather they collect reviews directly from people who have purchased the products.

By: Enkaedu

Enkaedu — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 11:55:01 +0000

I really wish questionable businesses were not getting the silly bucks again. Makes it so much harder when the hangover comes in the morning. Nothing less fun than bringing a good business to a grumpy VC with a hangover.

By: amiz

amiz — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 11:50:25 +0000

http://www.viewscore.com was the first to launch this service so i agree with daniel nothing new here…

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 10:28:06 +0000

Amazing they ask for $4million and get it. I’d find it really useful if there could be examples or case studies on how startups typically spend the millions they are given. Of the $4 million what ratio is spent on existing staff/hiring new staff/technology/infrastructure?

Perhaps also how the whole funding mechanism works – how the money is physically made available to the company, who needs to agree to the spending to make it happen etc.

I think a lot of people might also be interested to learn more about the way funding rounds work in practice.

Thanks, Chris

By: Daniel

Daniel — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 09:46:06 +0000

was….;)