Cuil – a case of what not to do.
For those that have already forgotten, yeah that’s like everyone, Cuil launched in July 2008.
No one cared.
Cuil launched, and didn’t work, results sucked, the site went down, etc. As launches go, it was a dud.
Being stealth in general, is LAME, IMHO. No idea is that revolutionary, and hello! Cuil was a search engine! Stealth just raises the bar high, higher than you probably want. How about you embrace the web, stop being so secretive? Get the community behind you?
Techcrunch has a good write up on Cuil’s loserness.
From time to time Tom and I have thought to keep something underwraps, save it up for a big announcement, etc. It always blows up in our faces, without fail. Some one will call us out “I was going to blog about your event, but you had no sponsors up” or something like that, when in fact we had sponsors, but were waiting to announce on a certain day, whoops!
This is short and it’s my take, but don’t be stealth, and don’t be lame, and don’t rely on hype to define your value. Be worthwhile, and be something people will want to use. Don’t be a 33mil money trap, “Google killer”, don’t be an anything killer! Just be. Be good, be a venture that meets a need, not a venture looking for a problem.
Buh bye Cuil, it was an uneventful life, and you’ll be remembered… ok well you won’t, but thanks for all the fish.
