Crunchbase admits it may need to learn more about Creative Commons

I was part of the team that created Crunchbase at Techcrunch and it is really sad to see what has happen, since the way People+ are using Crunchbase is exactly as intended with the design.<p>I can remember the specific conversation about picking CC-BY+A, it was because we wanted other apps to use the data, even if they were competing with us (and they were)<p>It also seems they have dumped the open API, previously you could just add &#x27;.js&#x27; to any page and get a JSON representation of it, no developer signup, no stupid API key, etc.<p><a href="http://api.crunchbase.com/v/1/company/facebook.js" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;api.crunchbase.com&#x2F;v&#x2F;1&#x2F;company&#x2F;facebook.js</a><p>My impression now is that since the AOL acquisition Crunchbase has tried to retract a lot of its openness, which was a big reason for its success.<p>I think the key difference is that we saw Crunchbase as a free service to the startup community that would reinforce Techcrunch, while AOL see it as having a distinct and independent commercial value.

I think the comments by Matt Kaufman (president of Crunchbase) about the damage that can be caused by &quot;Crunchbase replicas&quot; reflect the knowledge on AOL&#x27;s part that Crunchbase is a potentially very interesting data asset. And so the reality is that they&#x27;ll prob revisit rights to Crunchbase, and it&#x27;ll go from very open to something less so (how far is the question). I would also guess that Crunchbase has a paid subscription offering in the works.<p>I would also speculate that People+ may be the first &quot;offender&quot; Crunchbase will target. Datafox.co, Mattermark, Inkwire.io might all find themselves in the crosshairs.<p>This also underscores a common mistake developers make which is creating on someone else&#x27;s platform where the rules can and will change significantly especially when monetization becomes important. And it seems monetization is on Crunchbase&#x27;s mind.<p>Update:<p>This post on the Crunchbase blog articulates that monetization is coming and that the above &quot;offenders&quot; may be hearing from AOL counsel soon.<p><a href="http://info.crunchbase.com/2013/11/05/crunchbase-people-and-the-eff/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;info.crunchbase.com&#x2F;2013&#x2F;11&#x2F;05&#x2F;crunchbase-people-and-...</a><p>&quot;CrunchBase must remain open to anyone who wants to contribute, and retrieving that data for non-commercial benefit must remain open as well. That said, to invest in CrunchBase’s constant improvement requires building a business around CrunchBase in a way that successfully takes into account our terms of service and our openness.&quot;

How reliable is Crunchbase, anyway? In my experience, its frequently outdated and incorrect, but I don&#x27;t search it often.

I love Crunchbase but I would have more sympathy for them if their long tail content was given a bit more maintenance love. If your content stagnates, you deserve competition. To be fair this takes effort, but how many young people would knock themselves out for a low paid or unpaid internship there to get this stuff done? It seems more like a lack of caring, although admittedly I&#x27;m an ignorant outsider.

AOL are used to <i>doing</i> the content exploiting, not being the ones having all the value extracted from their work.

I&#x27;ve caught Crunchbase employees blatantly copying and pasting content from AngelList - which is not Creative Commons as far as I&#x27;m aware. I&#x27;m surprised they&#x27;re up in arms over this.

Sounds like Twitter -- &quot;It&#x27;s open, contribute all you want, until you want to get all of the data back out; Then you have to pay&quot;