Condé Nast can’t really be called a pure magazine publishing company any longer. They acquired Digg-clone Reddit last year, adding a user generated news site to their stable of offline and online magazines. And today they launched a social networking site aimed at teen girls called Flip.
The majority of Flip is content created by users, called Flipbooks. It consists of customizable, rich media blog/journals and include text, photos, music and videos. Users can also customize their Flipbooks with stickers, templates and other decorations available on the site. Flip also has four content channels: My Life; Entertainment; Style; and The World. Each channel highlights user content and also has professional editorial, presumably grabbed from other Condé Nast publications.
One thing Flip doesn’t seem particularly concerned with at this time is security of its users. Unlike Piczo, which also caters to a young teen audience, Flip profiles are freely browsable and searchable. This allows the site to create more networks and generates extra page views, but it also allows predators to browse profiles of young teenage girls. Given that Piczo has seen tremendous growth even with these precautions in place, I’m surprised Flip didn’t copy them.
“…but it also allows predators to browse profiles of young teenage girls.” Now that’s just special.
Cool name, but let’s see how many flip-flop or just flop references we can count in the media in the coming days.
In the internet economy for growth companies have to be smart, nimble and dynamic. Regarding security, I think todays’ kids are smart enough to outwit predators by selves.
http://www.tekn...ld.blogspot.com
Why do you consider Reddit to be a Digg clone? I tend to think that a “clone” is basically the same thing as the original and perhaps applied to a niche market.
If so, every video site would be a YouTube clone, Google an Altavista clone (probably even more so than Reddit is a Digg clone), and so on… I see Reddit more in between Digg and Delicious than a pure “Digg clone”. That SUperGu site you wrote about the other day – that was a Digg clone.. a Meneame clone to be precise, and Meneame being a Digg clone. Arhg, never mind….
In any case, I also agree that certain precautions should be in place for this Flip site, especially if you’re creating a social site for teen girls.
This is interesting.
They really have a good shot at this market.
Girls tend to attract boys to these things and they have some serious competences in the girly stuff.
Good to see a traditional company using its expertise to make some serious money on the internet
i don’t know ’bout this one
but i’m more inkling on the flop side; flip will flop – it just seems/feels diluted and not very substancy
the problem is that you cant verify identities with the internet. this is really weird.
either way, i dont see the market with teen girls. where are the revenues coming from?
Y.A.S.N ? What’s unique about this network? It does look very nice though.
I totally agree with RBA, reddit is not a digg clone.
If reddit is a digg clone, then Digg is a slashdot clone (or at least kuro5hin clone)
I’m tired of all these “Flips” on social networking site…time for something new!!!
Not providing better security precautions to a site that caters to teen girls renders it not much better than MySpace. My kids will only be allowed to go to sites that provide secure profiles that aren’t freely browsable and available to the public. That’s a recipe for disaster, IMO.
Its not about being. Its happening in every community.I have heard the news of my space being used by females for prostitution.
It will all depend to what an extent they can do moderation.
So how much will Flip differ from MySpace? Good looking site though.
“Teens” have MySpace. Do they really need another “social network” to bare their skin on for more attention?
This is a much better site than Sugar, going after the same dimwits.
Looking through Condé Nast magazine list I can’t see a magazine that matches the Flip target audience. Teen Vogue maybe but that does seem to be for an older group. So will Flip test the brand and the magazine follow?
Dull and boring – its basically slide.com but without a widget you can take with you. Don’t see the point of all these mini web page companies – just masking themselves as some kind of a “social network”.
Well, no wonder they didn’t sell me the domain name for $20000. Truly. I ended up with flipsy after my attempts to buy flipit.com stalled as well.
Hey, Chris Gonzalez from Flip here. I appreciate you raising the security question – given that it’s one of our top priorities in the launch of the site. Here’s a link to more information on Flip about our safety guidelines, community rules and more: http://www.flip.../internetsafety. To topline key steps we’ve taken:
- Allow users to set privacy permissions on their flipbooks, to share only with friends (or no one) if they choose
- Do not ask for or display first and last name, email, cell phone numbers, or IM handles
- Unable to search members by location, real name or age.
- All flipbook assets hosted by Flip; unable to reference outside services. Gives Flip the ability to view and take down any assets.
- Hands-on team of moderators on the site 24/7, assisted by sophisticated moderation tools and scanning technologies to find and remove content that may be of concern
- Links on flipbooks profiles and clubs so users can report content that may be of concern
- Partnered with WiredSaftey.org and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to review advise us on our safety measures as well as, The Teen Angels, a youth advocacy group to develop flipbooks for their peers about Internet Safety.
I hope this helps give more context. As Flip grows and evolves, safety will remain a top concern that we’ll continually evaluate and improve on.
It’s amazing how fickle the techcrunch commenters are. Not a week ago everyone was singing the praises of Splashcast… Flip seems like a far more usable, feature-rich and well-designed content creation tool that performs nearly the same service.
“- Do not ask for or display first and last name, email, cell phone numbers, or IM handles
- Unable to search members by location, real name or age.”
are teens actually interested in connecting based on no information about age or location???? i took a quick look the other day and had not noticed it yet, but would not be surprised to see “layla13NYC” type names showing up
per an earlier comment/question, Conde owns ym.com which had a decent sized and actve community at one point.
We’ve talked a lot with traditional publishers in the past six or so months (for StyleDiary) so I’m not surprised to see traditional media in the womens/teens niche starting to try to push new media initiatives. Definitely expect more news to come there! It’s great because I think it has become very necessary to their survival and though in our experience, we’ve found some to maybe not be super new media or internet savvy, it’s still really cool to see things develop in our niche.
Granted, I think a few of the new media players (PopSugar, Glam, us
hehe) maybe have a bit more of a foothold on their market than what they should have allowed, but it’s still fun to watch this all develop no less!
Very cool!
I run WiredSafety.org. We work closely with Piczo, as well as Flip. I read the comments, and as a fellow blogger (parryaftab.blogspot.com) thought I would weigh in.
Piczo is different. It doesn’t permit searching of members, which can help create a safer environment. But it also makes it harder for teens to find each other when they are looking for friends from camp, their old town or even their current town.
There are ways to protect teens from predators without prohibiting search. You can provide education and awareness on their roles in protecting themselves by being more responsible and thinking before they click. You can also teach them to look out for their friends online.
While a great deal of hype has been made about predators seeking teens and preteens online, we need ot understand that to my knowledge, to date, in each and every case, the teens and preteens have gone willingly to every meeting offline. They may have thought they were meeting a cute 14-year old boy, but they knew that they were meeting someone they didn’t know in real life.
Our teenangels (teenangels.org) volunteers are experts in their own right, having been trained in all aspects of safe, private and responsible interactive technology use.
They have set up their own profile on flip and are fighting over who can use it next. They find it fun, exciting and creative.
I have set up my own profile there as well, in wiredsafety capacity. I had a blast using it, and trying to figure things out (the teens taught me
)
I donate my time running this charity, but used to represent most of the kids Internet industry. I’d put my money on this site. It’s easy to use, encourages creativity and puts safety first. They are adopting new technologies that add something special. They are also asking teens what they want and getting their help building it. It will be more content rich than Piczo, which is designed for networking with existing friends.
Not many sites allow us to be a watchdog from within. Piczo does. And now Flip does too. They have adopted all best practice requirements we set as a condition to using our tips and working with us. We’re tough. Sites willing to bite that bullet have to be serious about safety.
It’s not myspace. It’s controlled, monitored and still small enough that we can keep an eye on growth and help teach teens to look out for each other and themselves. It will attract many teens who are disenchanted with MySpace and no longer happy with a facebook open to everyone. I suspect it will take traffic from facebook more than myspace, and be a site the kids will use in addition to some others to hang out.
Will teens act out? sure. that’s their job.
But hopefully we’ll create an atmosphere where “kewl” can exist alongside safe. It won’t be easy, but we’re there to help. And so are our expert teens.
my 2 cents.
Thanks,
Parry Aftab
So what’s the social network for guys going to b called?