Let’s Get Down To Some Hard Core Knitting

July 15th, 2007 at 4:57 pm

Wow..17,000 people for a knitting social network? We are starting to see a social network for every vertical. I guess anytime you have a vertical you’ll have advertisers looking to access that aggregated community. I’d like to understand how big the TAM (Total Available Market) for knitting could be.

This Reminds me of the dotcom boom in 1999 where we had every offline retailing vertical going online. I hope these social networks don’t implode like PETS.COM or eToys.com. If this gets VC funded I know boom times are back!

July 15th, 2007 at 4:58 pm

@Karthik - Can you enlighten us on how Ravelry is marketing itself? I’m really curious now that you brought it up.

July 15th, 2007 at 5:17 pm

omg, so many knitting blogs…
http://www.technorati.com/blogs/tag/knitting

July 15th, 2007 at 5:32 pm

I worked in tech support for a regional Australian ISP about a decade ago, and even then the “crafty demographic” was small, but enthusiastic and surprisingly technically aware.

Don’t underestimate the internet awareness of intelligent older people with free time and spare cash. Of course, there are still enough people in their 20’s who knit (crafty SAHMs for a start) to make a decent sized niche market.

July 15th, 2007 at 5:36 pm

wow … I can’t wait for the RPS Social Network … LOL

Darin

July 15th, 2007 at 5:39 pm

Knitters of the world untie!

July 15th, 2007 at 5:51 pm

Hey - it’s Casey from Ravelry..

Ha. I’m surprised to see us here on TechCrunch. (You know, ‘knitting’ and all…)

Ravelry is the result two of us (one knitter and one coder) building something that we saw a need for. This isn’t a toy me-too social site - it’s a site for knitters and crocheters that has a social component. We’re pretty proud of what we’ve got so far and our users are having a blast.

There isn’t any marketing to speak of - people like it and they post about it on their blogs

July 15th, 2007 at 6:21 pm

OMG - Knitters are incredibly tech-savvy! Most have figured out that online yarn is cheaper and more varied that what’s carried in their LYS (that’s “local yarn shop/store” for you non-fiber freaks), and add to that the plethora of free knit/crochet patterns online… Knitting is a rather technical hobby, as more advanced projects require a solid understanding of physics, geometry, algebra, chemistry, etc. A rather profitable one, too, I should add - FINE yarn is far from cheap (avg $5-15 or more per ball). Many knitting stores are finding their way online with local events, sales, “yarn tastings” and more in an effort to capitalize on the online knit/crochet crowd - like my fav LYS, Unwind: http://www.yellowbot.com/unwind-burbank-ca.html

“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but sticks and string excite me.”

July 15th, 2007 at 6:52 pm

Considering it’s the knitting podcasts that continue to kick our butts on iTunes, I’m not surprised. Every time I see a knitting podcast, I can’t help think of a quote by the great Pee-Wee Herman:
The mind plays tricks on you. You play tricks back! It’s like you’re unraveling a big cable-knit sweater that someone keeps knitting and knitting and knitting and knitting and knitting and knitting…

July 15th, 2007 at 7:27 pm

Knitters are more tech savvy than you’d think. They’re also younger ;o) I’m a knitter - I’m 35 and have been messing with ‘puters and the ‘net since…well since the Apple IIe was considered high-tech and IRC was only heard of by major geeks. I understand that most knitters aren’t in the same tech-ballpark as I am but still…we’re not all sitting in rocking chairs knitting baby booties (or crocheting doilies), either.

July 15th, 2007 at 7:40 pm

I think it’s important to note that Ravelry is not solely or primarily a social site. I do enjoy the social aspect of it, but I am using it mainly as a central location to track my progress on projects and catalog my yarn, patterns, books, etc. It’s also a reference for yarns to use with certain patterns, patterns to use with certain yarns, etc.

July 15th, 2007 at 8:09 pm

Hey Arrington. Maybe a little less pejorative language next time? Not everyone is as interested as you are in news from tech startups, but we still try to treat you and your work with respect. How about returning the favour to hobbyists of different stripes, eh?

July 15th, 2007 at 8:14 pm

hmmm…knitting not so farfetched. remindes me of all the useless lanyards i wove as a kid at summer camp. This site may be on to something. I would expand to other content popular with the knitting demographic say, cats and chocolate and maybe rename to Ravelry, Cattery & Ecstasy…

July 15th, 2007 at 8:15 pm

No offense taken! I am a beta tester for Ravelry and it is truly filling a need. I only hope that the makers of the site make a fortune off of it.

And as for them recruiting A-list bloggers, I am definitely NOT a-list. I’m just a knitter.

July 15th, 2007 at 8:32 pm

I’m a knit-blogger - I have been for about 1 1/2 years. I also am on Ravelry and I think it’s wonderful (user id: theknittingpatch) - Also, I work in the tech field as an analyst and a trainer. We knitters are definitely savvy!

July 15th, 2007 at 8:38 pm

Not sure about sparks… string maybe. Or is it yarn? Yawn.

July 15th, 2007 at 8:51 pm

17,000 isn’t really that surprising when you consider the millions of people who knit. I bet there are more knitters online than people interested in Web 2.0, for example. It’s always easy to forget we’re the niche here

Still, not surprising when you consider the size of comparable communities in, say, fishing, horseriding, hunting, etc.

July 15th, 2007 at 9:17 pm

Great, now I can move forward with my social networking site idea for the basket weaving community. I should get funded easily.
fz

July 15th, 2007 at 9:25 pm

Knitters and knitbloggers are not all women. For example, check out The Panopticon and his links. Knitters ARE an extremely congenial and supportive community, many members of which also happen to be, at one extreme, seriously geektastic and, at another extreme, just techknowledgeable enough to show off pictures of their passion and surf other sites for ideas and pretty knitting. Ditto on the widespread influence and huge readership of the Yarn Harlot. Also, two Fridays ago a knitalong (KAL) called Mystery Stole 3 with about 6600 members temporarily broke Yahoo groups trying to download a pattern clue at the same time. Knitter power! Pick up some pointy sticks, visit a local yarn store for tips and new friendships, and join the fun!

July 15th, 2007 at 9:30 pm

Not my scene.

1daysports.com

July 15th, 2007 at 9:57 pm

Ravelry is something that enables me to work more efficiently and to design things more efficiently. I am a knitting pattern design, who originally was headed for a chem e degree in college. I was first in my state in math in high school. I am super tech savy. Our first computer was “portable”. My dad is a class A computer nerd. He and his computer are attached at the hip. I got to play with an 8086 as a kid and learned how to write simple programs for fun. I was confused when I went to junior high and they did not have computers. I even got to play on the internet in the late 80s.

I have always been one of the few computer nerds in my groups, so it was logical that I started looking for stuff online. This eventually lead me to knitting blogs and I realized that a blog would be a great tool to catalog my art. This created a community for me.

Ravelry has enabled knitters to share more details in a concise manner. Thanks to Casey and Jess

July 16th, 2007 at 1:37 am

Ravelry is for more than just knitters. It began with knitters and crocheters in mind, but it is open to anyone pursuing a fiber art medium who needs a place to catalog their supplies (yarn and tools). I knit, weave, spin, sew, dye fabric and yarn, (and I’m college-educated as well as quite computer savvy to boot). When someone is heavily involved in the fiber arts as I am, they will amass an extraordinary amount of yarn or raw fiber and develop what I call an arsenal of needles and hooks. I can’t possibly keep track of this on my own; what Ravelry has done is to make it easy for me to accomplish this task. That it allows me to partake of some networking and socializing with other fiber nuts is a side benefit.

One of my favorite methods for choosing yarn colors for a project is to gather several yarns that complement each other or share some color similarities (such as different variegates that all have a blue in them) then base the color changes on a Fibonacci sequence. Oh—I’m sorry—over your heads?

July 16th, 2007 at 2:42 am

Many of the commenters here have made excellent points about the number of tech-savvy people in the online knitting community (aka the knitternet), and about the nuklber of knitters who are men. John Dalton also points out that not all of the 17,000 people in Ravelry are in North America. And not all of them are young. I’m a New Zealand/Australian woman in her mid-fifties who has a tech-based job. I have been knitting for more than 40 years, and I’ve been using the internet for socialising for more than ten years, not always with knitters. I’ve had a knitting blog for 3.5 years. It doesn’t pay to make assumptions about people based on their age, gender or hobbies.

July 16th, 2007 at 4:28 am

Ravelry is really fun! I have been beta testing for about 2 months. It fills in all of the gaps that blogging leaves….its not just comments, its deep stash conversations and detailed project info. My knitblog started as a record of my knitting projects and then the social aspect evolved….but Ravelry does both of those things BETTER for me!

Beware knitters. We are tech savvy. We run your IT departments, your libraries, your labs. We are your friends, sisters, brothers, mothers. Do not make fun of what you do not understand!

July 16th, 2007 at 5:49 am

Boy, aren’t you non-believers cute. Like some others here, I, too, work in the tech sector. Electrical Engineering degree, thank you very much. And….*gasp*….I KNIT! And blog. And I’m having fun with Ravelry.

Hmm. Were you guys the ones who asked “Oh? You’re a double-E? Elementary Education?” “No, Electrical Engineering.” And then walked away because you couldn’t handle it? I wondered where all of you who were intimidated by me at parties went to. (Not that Elementary Ed isn’t a respectable major - it just doesn’t seem to scare you men quite the same way, does it?)

Michael - I do appreciate your sense of humor. It’s everyone else who seem to have negative comments that I don’t get.

July 16th, 2007 at 9:46 am

Mukesh — the site is still in beta — they’re still in the midst of acquiring servers and data center hosting and the like, so they currently can’t handle the amount of traffic that they’d get if all interested parties pounced on them. They’re sending out about 1000 invites a week to those who’ve signed up to join, and last I heard, hope to open up to everyone in about a month.

Michelle (comment #39 up ^ there) hit the nail on the head — the most appealing aspect of Ravelry to many of us is the very user-friendly searchable database of members’ yarn stash, patterns and projects. For example — I recently scored some gorgeous cashmere yarn, but am not entirely sure what I want to make with it. In a couple of clicks, I can see which other Ravelry members own that exact yarn, and what projects they’ve made with it. I can look at patterns associated with those projects, and if I see a pattern I like, I can also see other people’s versions of that project, perhaps knit with different yarn. The real appeal is information and inspiration at our fingertips, when before, it would take lengthy and somewhat unorganized Google searches and Google Blog searches to find the information we wanted.

None of this will interest a non-knitter, however, and might, in fact, perplex them, which is understandable. I personally can’t understand why people devote entire websites to Moleskine notebooks, cool as they are….

-Mary
(knitter, blogger, Healthcare I.T. consultant and NOT a grandma)

July 16th, 2007 at 10:07 am

As a member, a knitter, crocheter, spinner and wanna be coder I have to say that Ravelry’s basic layout and ease of use is something alot of other socializing networks should take note of.

While it wouldn’t work for merely a social network toy, it would be a valuable tool for collectors etc anyone who needs to be able to catalog things and likes to be able to share with other likeminded people.

Casey and Jess have really done a great job pulling this together.

July 16th, 2007 at 10:57 am

I’ve been a member of Ravelry since early May and have found it to be an incredible resource. And knitters are very tech savvy–perhaps you should check out last week’s NY Times article about that very aspect of the craft. Knit blogging and podcasting have become indispensable to many knitters, and Ravelry is just the latest component of that.

July 16th, 2007 at 12:45 pm

For actual news media coverage of the resurgent tide of knitting (hard to hold back the tide with those size 4 dpns) see the New York Times article from July 12. For more on men who do it, see ,a href=”http://thecrochetdude.biz/”.The Crochet Dude’s blog.
For a better attitude toward gender differences and similarities, look outside yourself and remember there’s a big ol’ world out there apart from Silicon Valley. (And women can be techies too.)

July 16th, 2007 at 3:15 pm

I saw plenty of comments throughout about the number of knitters in their 20s and 30s. This is certainly true, but that usually reduces the conversation to those of the “not your grandma’s knitting” variety. You might be more surprised at the number of older knitters who are tech-savvy too … I am 48, and have been computing (seemingly!) forever, but many of my knitting friends are far older than me, and are just as capable of using a computer to help them pursue their interests as the young ones!

July 16th, 2007 at 3:42 pm

I think Michelle (#39) and Mary (#54) are quite right. Ravelry works best for organizing my knitting materials and also to find new projects that catch my eye. It is beautifully designed and extremely user-friendly. If there was something similar for all my painting supplies, you can bet I’d sign up.

I would like to point out gently to my fellow knitters that only a couple of disparaging remarks have been made, and some of those may have even been tongue-in-cheek. There is a difference between standing up for our craft and jumping on the defensive every time someone makes a joke, and that difference might be the making of an enemy or a convert.

July 16th, 2007 at 5:00 pm

Hi, just had to put in my 2c - what Casey and Jess have provided for those of us who knit &/or crochet is amazing! I’m very type-A and have been trying to figure out a way to organize my yarn stash and projects (wips, hibernating, completed, and future) and needles, et al. It’s also a great way to network socially.

I think we knitters are pretty protective of each other because for so long the craft has been considered frumpy or old or silly. It’s an amazing craft for many reasons, not least of which is the amazing people who love it so much!

And it’s *always* (tongue in cheek there) dangerous to generalize any group of people. Again, just because the craft has a rich and lengthy history doesn’t mean that only a bunch of old diddies are knitting - there’s a lot of youngin’s out there knitting who are very tech saavy.

July 16th, 2007 at 7:08 pm

you’re right kristin! (knitter married to a techie)

it seems like all you “techies” now have someone to make fun of… finally there is someone less cool than you?!

come on, now– let’s be friends! even techies need mittens in the winter!!!

ps i love ravelry.

July 17th, 2007 at 1:31 am

I find it terribly amusing that you posted what you thought was an innocently-snarky little snippet and got 60+ comments all of the arched-eyebrow, “Oh really?” variety.

The only thing I haven’t heard anyone mention here was the huge monetary power that knitters hold.

A bank shut down a Blue Moon Fiber Art’s credit-card processing and refunded all the customers’ money because they couldn’t believe that so many people would want to buy yarn, and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars. Hundreds Of Thousands, people.

Also is the amazing phenomenon of Crash And Burn when high-profile online shops put up new stock. How many people would have to access TechCrunch simultaneously in order to crash the site? Well, that many people frequently “show up” virtually to buy yarn at sites like The Loopy Ewe and Scouts Swag and end up taking the sites offline until the traffic dies down and the site can be brought up again.

There’s a lot of us, we don’t like rudeness, and we all carry at least two very pointy sticks.

July 17th, 2007 at 6:52 am

I think many of the points I would like to make have already been covered. I would like to reinforce the link between techies and knitters/crafters in general though. Many, many knitters work in IT or related fields. There’s nothing better after spending hours at a PC coding something to create something virtual (in that it exists only as zeroes and ones) than engaging in a handicraft of some kind and making something that you can touch. There is also a growing trend towards handmade items as opposed to mass-produced items. Just look at etsy.com.

Of course some of the bigger craft email lists and newsgroups have been around since the web was just a twinkle in Tim thingummy’s eye.

July 17th, 2007 at 7:27 am

Forgot, sorry, for Frankzappa- there is a basketweaving forum…http://www.basketmakers.org/topics/beginners/beginnersmenu.htm

And for Nemrut- http://www.thecatsite.com/forums/ - a forum for cat lovers and http://www.chocolatereview.co......efault.asp a forum for chocolate.

I’m not interested personally but I performed a simple Google search to find these.

Mr. Arrington, most of us are playing nice. We might be a bit offended initially but we hope you and your readers learn a little about the new group you invited over just by mentioning something that is near and dear to many of us. If anything, be thrilled by all the attention you’ve received. You’ll probably get some new readers!

July 17th, 2007 at 10:54 am

Why do people insist on ridiculing an age-old hobby? Knitting has been around for eons…how else did people cloth themselves back in the day? The knit sweaters, socks, hats to keep their families warm and/or clothed.

I think it’s wonderful that I’m able to share my crafts with my mother and/or grandmother. I admire the work that they did and the items they created. I’m proud to be able to do the same.

And I’m a 32 year old, software developer and new mom, who knits, crochets (yes, sometimes doilies to my grandmother’s delight), and quilts. I also scrapbook (digitally .)

July 17th, 2007 at 1:00 pm

I heard about Ravelry by word of mouth… I knit with a group of ladies once a month and they were all talking about it…

July 17th, 2007 at 3:44 pm

I concur with what most of the knitters have already posted. I’d like to add, as information, that the publishing industry estimates that there are 50 million knitters in North America.

As far as the usefulness of a site like Ravelry: as was alluded to before, knitting isn’t cheap. The materials for a nice sweater could cost $100-$200. A lace project can be very time consuming - one mistake can throw the whole pattern off and it could take hours to undo and fix. A site like Ravelry allows a knitter to view how a yarn and a pattern go together, find errata for published patterns, and determine if a pattern will suit a particular body type - all before the money is spent. Information like this could only be found through search engines and lucky blog discoveries before Ravelry. Now the information is in one central place - a fantastic benefit to the craft.

I, too, work in the tech industry (electronic medical records, trainer and developer) and as was mentioned before, it is wonderful to sit and create something tangible and beautiful with your own hands at the end of the day. Do none of you remember that Rosie Greer needlepointed? Or is that revealing my age?

I had never seen this blog before, so thank Ravelry for adding at least one new reader. I’m sure there will be more.

July 17th, 2007 at 5:25 pm

So, there aren’t many tech savvy knitters out there, hmmmm? Google for knit blogs and see how many possibilities there are (FYI - 2,810,000). Now, multiply that by at least 2, because less than 1/2 of the knitters have blogs; hmmm, over 5 MILLION PEOPLE! And the average knitter spends $1,000 per year on yarn. Geez, starting to sound like a lot of money, isn’t it? And we haven’t even included people who spin, crochet, dye, felt, or weave, yet. Geez, I bet they spend money on their craft, too! Oh, but I forgot, we’re a small community.

And just when, smartass Tech Crunch, was the last time your post got 81 comments?

July 17th, 2007 at 6:41 pm

What do you think we’re doing while we’re waiting for the download to finish? Knittin’ a beanie, dude!

Knitting got a lot of support from the http://WWW. Free patterns, lessons, community, and programs for designing items. Ravelry bloomed from this. If you think knitters are dangerous, don’t even think of dissing the scrapbookers or you’ll have a festive holepunch where you don’t want it.

July 17th, 2007 at 9:35 pm

What I find hilarious in the some of the early comments is the naivete about the possibility of knitters being tech-savvy, or interested enough, to find and utilize something like Ravelry. There are plenty of us knitting geezers who may not IT folks, but who worked years in tech-reliant areas. (Although I did marry an IT head programmer. [g]) I moved into WP/DTP in the early 80’s - before some techies commenting were born, as I found after tracking back out of curiousity - on a dedicated Digital WPS8 system and went to All-in-1 VAX networks, to DECMate, to Word 2, PageMaker and Quark on a Mac, to playing around with computer graphics for fun in Paint Shop Pro and Painter on a PC at home. One of the first newsgroups I got involved in when I got online was the well-established rec.craft.textiles.yarn, where plenty of people still post today about weaving, spinning, dyeing, and especially knitting. I don’t know if I’ll join Ravelry when it gets out of beta, but aside from any social aspect, it’s going to be a huge database. What’s strange about wanting to access and organize data more easily?

The net wasn’t born yesterday any more than we were. We’ve had time to catch a few clues. My latest computer’s 4 months old. I’m 52. And yeah - I still knit. It’s amazing how useful knitting software, spreadsheets, graphics programs and digital cameras are in conjunction with each other and knitting, too.

July 18th, 2007 at 12:27 am

I’ve been knitting for 40 years and writing software for 25. I was active on various newsgroups 20 years ago. I’ve had my own websites for a dozen years or so. I’ve been blogging for a bit more than 3 years.

Bobbie… I remember when a “facsimile machine” required special heat-sensitive paper that had to be hand-placed around a roller. You had to be quick to get the phone receiver in the modem in time to catch the first part of the transmission.

Now I find that knitting is just the thing to keep me from reading email and browsing my favorite online LYS while I’m supposed to be attending to a tech (but boring) teleconference.

July 18th, 2007 at 9:17 am

We are all interconnected. I was 2 years into a chem e degree funded by a fistful of scholarships-calculus, analytical geometry, differential equations, FORTRAN, etc, finished with a MS in Geology worked for the US Geological Survey, universities, private consulting firms, had my own engineering company, and published peer reviewed scientific reports in all sorts of fields. I was a successful woman in a male-dominated world and it was a lonely place.

Now I farm sheep and angora rabbits, and dye their fiber for knitters and spinners. I grow organic apples and my family’s food. I knit or spin or do some kind of wool work every day as well as blog and am forever organizing my personal stash of 10 rubbermaid bins and hundreds of pounds of raw sheep’s wool, clean raw wool, processed wool, undyed yarn, dyed yarn, bags of rabbit wool, processed rabbit wool, undyed rabbit yarn………

I think the reason some of us knitters get defensive is because for most of our lives we’ve been overlooked for our brains and talent while watching our dimmer brethern being groomed for the best jobs and perks. Now we have a strong community and we’re not gonna take any disrespect, even if it’s only perceived disrespect.

July 18th, 2007 at 11:45 am

Just think of knit/purl as proto-binary. Think of knitting as a $1billion industry-in the US alone.

Ask your financial person how happy they would be if they could get several thousand international experts in your business to consult for nothing. We’re beta testing Ravelry(TM) not because we’re naive, but because the product is that great–sweat equity. I hope the founders get stinking rich. They deserve it.

I’m an MBA/finance type and consider myself relatively technically illiterate compared to my fellow Ravelers(TM) but I found you. Not hard…for a knitter.

July 18th, 2007 at 3:04 pm

I’d like to thank you Mike for this blurb and the resulting comments. I’ve found a dozen ‘new to me’ knit blogs that are all outside my usual circles.
That is what our knitting online culture is all about, finding the others, learning and expanding our skills.
If in an imaginary apocalypse, all our computers were fried and there were no more interweb, you could survive without them but you’d still need a sweater and some socks. The art and skills of knitting are timeless as long as we have bodies that need clothed.

July 19th, 2007 at 9:30 am

As the Yarn Harlot says, “It’s just more C.H.O.K.E.”. That’s Cultural Humiliation Of Knitters Everywhere. The first sentence of this “article” is patronizing and insulting. What an idiot! Why don’t you do some research of the topic you’re writing about before you write? You’re writing about Ravelry, but you’re also writing about knitting and obviously don’t know a thing about it.