The Color of Money

Article summary: Color is an app. It might be successful, it might not. Sequoia believes, the internet doesn't.

Great idea, terrible execution.

One flaw I see in this big idea that nobody seems to see is the total anonymity of the process of sharing and the inability to select/delete the content you see (or at least, I tried and I could not find one).<p>This sounds to me like Chatroulette: there was much hype about it at the beginning and then it started filling with guys showing their genitals.<p>How long will it take before people start uploading questionable content? Even if not done on purpose, just think about using the app in a 100 ft. radius from a swingers club/gay bar. Something probably you don't want to have on your phone.

<i>Shouldn’t we be rooting for it to succeed? Ultimately, wouldn’t that be better for everyone across the board? The startups, the investors, and the users?<p>Of course.</i><p>I suppose this is good for the community as long as <i>every</i> one of these gambles works, but the reality is that not every one does, and I would imagine investors would become increasingly skittish because of it.

Can someone summarize the vision here? Everything I've seen has made this look like a weekend project (except for the $41MM thing).

<p><pre><code> "If you had more capital, could you get to the future faster?" "Will $25M help you get five years into one?" -- @Sequoia_Capital invest in Time Machine </code></pre> <a href="http://twitter.com/#!/nivertech/status/51047798413606912" rel="nofollow">http://twitter.com/#!/nivertech/status/51047798413606912</a>

I really want to know why they didn't launch at SXSW....it would have been the perfect place to launch this

Surely this is a tech investment that can either succeed in its own right or be bought by a major player. How long is it till Facebook will need to start propping its platform with startups to keep improving their tech.

Maybe I'm naive, doesn't $41M for two years of runway seem like a lot of cash to be burning through? How many people are they planning on hiring/what other costs do they have while they explore this space?

<i>This is a company working on a big idea that got a large amount of funding to work on that big idea uninterrupted for a couple of years.</i><p>Given the reminder of why Duke Nukem failed making its way up the board this is actually quite funny. Not having constraints can often be a bad thing, not a good one.<p>And regardless of this, what is the 'big' idea? There's nothing big about it. It's a pathetically small idea.<p>This is why the bubble thing is making the rounds, there's nothing big about social apps, they're notoriously hard to make any return on.

Many may disagree with me here. I'm not going to comment on the money, because that's what everyone else is doing.<p>I downloaded the Color app. I like it. I'm in downtown San Francisco. A number of other people apparently are using it right now, so I'm able to see some local content.<p>I think the setup experience is very nicely done. Its simple. Ask for a name, then it takes a photo of you using the front facing camera.<p>The interface is minimal and well designed. I'm not buried in tons of options I don't need. I played with everything for a few minutes and it didn't take long to get the hang of it.<p>Its insanely easy to upvote and leave a comment on someone's photo. I was actually surprised that my comment went through as soon as I hit Done, instead of showing me what the comment looks like and another button to post it.<p>The only thing that threw me off a little was the layout of images. The feeling I get from the interface is its reminiscent of Windows Phone OS. I personally kind of like that non-iOS kind of interface, in that its something new and interesting, but not bad. If that's where they indeed took their inspiration from, its not a bad source.<p>So money or not, I've had fun using it today.