Today I am launching StartupTweet, a website I dreamed up last Friday. StartupTweet allows anyone to contribute to a knowledge-share of resources (posts, links, video, files) focused on startups and entrepreneurs. With the help of Zvi Band, who created our wonderful logo, I was able to get StartupTweet built, launched and populated with content all within a single weekend.
What’s StartupTweet Do?
Think of StartupTweet as a cross between Del.icio.us, Mahalo and Hacker News. My idea is for a ‘better’ social bookmaking site specifically targeted at entrepreneurs and startups. Probably ten times a week or so I end up intensely searching Google for resources, recommendations or advice. Help is out there, but it’s scattered across blogs, video sites or hidden in interviews and PowerPoints. My goal with StartupTweet is to have a community help neatly assemble all that great content, advice and resources in one spot.
Why Did I Make This?
First, I’m competitive. A number of people I greatly respect have launched small web projects over the summer including Darren Herman’s FutureMeme, Josh Kopelman’s Funding Sleuth, and Matt Winn’s Venture Capital database. Second, StartupTweet is a service that I have wanted badly for about a year. Third, the idea of launching a site within a weekend was a challenge and I wanted to see if I could do it.
How is StartupTweet a better social bookmaking site? Well, unlike Del.icio.us StartupTweet lets you embed any media you like and you are not limited by how much you can write as a description. You can also comment allowing others to add new resources, or debate points helping to hone the quality of content. Also, since WordPress is the backend, all the posts are taggable and easy to find later. The tag cloud is the main navigation point.
Interface. StartupTweet doesn’t look like a traditional blog or bookmarking site. It looks like…Twitter. The “tweetâ€� aspect of the name comes from how content is posted, in Twitter-like fashion, but without the 140 character limit.
Finally inspiration definitely came from Hacker News. I love Hacker News and Techmeme, but the focus is on locating recently published content and not on saving content for easy consumption at a later date. In that way, I hope StartupTweet can complement Hacker News and Techmeme as stuff is cross-posted when it is more resource than news.
Update: StartupTweet has a new layout/interface as of 5/15/2009. Same objectives. Enjoy!