The Next Web blog - normally great - has had a slight crisis of confidence and attacked TechCrunch UK’s report on the demise of Naked. Blogger David Petherick says they had all the facts about Naked a month ago but chose not to delve into why the firm had cashflow problems or make “a dramatic, and possibly premature, pronouncement of death” because this would not have been a “helpful” approach.
This is kind’ve an odd post.
They say they had close contact with Naked, which quite clearly went into formal administration in early May. Yet they didn’t report it when they were legally able to do so.
On the one hand I understand their motives. Maybe they wanted to give Naked some breathing space to find new backers? They were clearly close to the company. David Petherick of The Next Web commented on the story: “I have had a personal interest in this project since meeting with Naked at StartupCamp in London in March, and Next Web staff have used the beautiful beta version of Naked, and I personally find it very useful.”
But as anyone knows, you can’t sit on a story forever. Sooner or later it will come out. Besides, if the company is any good, then reporting that it has gone into administration is not going to spook a proper new investor. It may even help find them a new one. And there’s an obligation to inform the reader here.
Interestingly, The Next Web also seems to think that the story’s reference to Bonnier’s divource proceedings freezing his assets and stopping further funding to Naked was “salacious”. Actually I think it’s rather relevant. Bonnier was - by all accounts - the sole backer of the enterprise. If his ability to pump more cash into the company was stopped then we need to know why. Furthermore, the allegation wasn’t made by me - it was made by his co-founder Tom Vandendooren and COO, not some junior employee.
Nor did I “selectively unearth” anything about Bonnier. As anyone who Googles this guy will know, there is a very long list of ventures he’s been involved in. It is a fact he was investigated, and cleared of any involvement, in an insider-dealing scam in the 1990s. It is a fact that in 2004 he was fined £290,000 for abuse of the financial markets, but was later able to return in 2006 as a CEO. It’s up to readers to decide if these facts are relevant to the story or not. It is also a fact that I called him and asked him to comment on the story and to date he has not called me back.
Meanwhile, as is often the case, the comments which flood in on any story are often at least as interesting as the story itself. And this has been the case with TechCrunch’s story on Naked. So let’s take a look at what people are saying - all the below have been extracted from the comments and can be read in full here.
• Was Naked’s application any good?
- Naked looked similar to Pownce, but it’s web-only status stopped it from going further.
- “I took part in some focus group testing of Naked during their alpha phase and all of our group were pretty certain within 10 minutes of using the app that it wouldn’t be a success. It was effectively a very poor implementation of Facebook walls (with group support) mashed with some lifestreaming (which I seem to remember was unimplemented at that stage). It was shocking to see quite how wrong they had got the user experience”
- “My understanding of ‘getting naked’ was that tooth extraction was preferable and certainly less painful.”
- (Gordon Candelin): “Not all the money was spent on premium web companies - I designed the beta site of Naked (which has been rather poorly implemented) and haven’t received a penny, nor am I likely to. While working with the Naked team I felt that were some very practical issues with user interface which unfortunately weren’t being addressed. They would have done better perhaps with a smaller dev team and a full time designer/UI expert to help inform the structure.”
• Were they over-staffed?
- “If it is employees then surely they would get down to the core few who will go with the idea and surely the other stuff can be bootstrapped?!”
- “Spending cash on 12 employees and two excellent but premium-rate web agencies at such an early stage doesn’t make sense to me.”
- “They 1) hired too many staff… 2) they used services from expensive agencies and web studios, and 3) rent an office in London known to be the most expensive place in the world.”
• Why did Naked fail?
- “Not getting enough first round funding. Then falling behind schedule technically…Followed by a lower than expected appetite for further investment”
- “Their CEO overestimated his abilities to acquire funding in time.”
Hey Mike - good to see you’re reading our blog.
I’ve added my response to your comment you made on The Next Web blog, but I see this has now popped up, so I guess I need to respond here.
1) The story/blog you ran missed out one important factor - Naked’s web site is still up and running, and invitations to use it are still available - and requests for invitations formed a very significant part of the comments on your story/blog - but only after I pointed out this omission.
2) Your story/blog is 3 weeks behind ours, and nothing has changed in a fiduciary sense for Naked in 3 weeks.
3) The Next Web didn’t report on the fact that the company was in liquidation because that’s not interesting. You can get that news from the statutory notices. The product and the way the admission of being in trouble was made was what was interesting - as was the fact that it was still open to people to use it - the very piece of news you missed.
4) Is it a story or is it a blog? Asking direct questions in a story, and then answering them yourself, or with others’ comments (especially if anonymous) is a great technique for persuasive argument. But I have to ask - does Techcrunch wrote stories or blogs?
5) Everyone loves a good online spat, especially if the language starts getting colourful and people get personal - but I don’t think you can characterise what I wrote as having ‘attacked’ you. Attack is rather an emotive word - very sorry if I touched a nerve - but ‘criticised’ is more how I’d describe it. I do apologise.
Best regards, David
Wow, many many many many times I’ve seen people use “of” instead of “‘ve”, but I think this is the first time I’ve seen the opposite mistake.
(yes, this is a “kind’ve” pointless comment)
Some quick thoughts:
The cash position and burn for getnkd would have been available to an investor prior to an investment. An article that points this out doesn’t hurt. Startups are routinely undercapitalized. Bad reviews can hurt but they are a necessary byproduct of having reliable vetters which , on balance, are essential to the start-up ecosystem.
If the value proposition is there, then any publicity actually helps a start-up. Heat is the friend of good products. As you have pointed out, getnkd was trumpeting their challenges in the hope that this could shake-out more investment or trials.
Most start-ups underestimate the time/challenges of the capital formation - stories like this are a great reminder to keep cash burn lean.
Bill
Make love not war
David - Mate you clearly dont get anything I am saying here. Let’s move on.
But for the record:
- Well done, you posted about this three weeks ago referencing an email Naked sent out. *Slap on back*. But you took it no further.
- Well done, yes the site is still there. Wow.
- “Nothing has changed in a fiduciary sense for Naked in 3 weeks”. FYI Going into administratoin is one thing. Liquidation is irreversible.
- “he Next Web didn’t report on the fact that the company was in liquidation because that’s not interesting.” Oh come on, are you serious?
- “Techcrunch wrote stories or blogs?” Depends on the hour of the day mate.
- “I don’t think you can characterise what I wrote as having ‘attacked’ you.” You say tomato, I say tomato. Let’s call the whole thing off. But to be honest a pretty long post “criticising” my report is pretty borderline. Whatever!
Go Mike!!!! You tell him!!!!!
Mike I get what you are saying mate, I just disagree with you!
And for the record: (Sound of underlining in background)
- The post I wrote was *not* simply a criticism of your report, it was pointing out that there were two important facts missing from your story about Naked:
Fact 1) The site is still up there.
Fact 2) You can check it out for yourself.
- You did not include those two facts - you said “We will now probably never know what Naked was capable of.” You could have played around with the Naked Beta with our compliments, for over three weeks now - and we published that fact! Duh!
- As for taking the story/blog no further - I had lengthy one-to-one conversations and exchanges of messages with a number of individuals who were the core team around Naked, in conversations that took place just a few days after their sending a message to their private beta users. I’m waiting for something to happen before I write my story. Liquidation is only a story when you establish who bought the assets.
- The great thing about a blog is that I was able to add my thoughts to the debate and say - wait - no - you can find out what it’s capable of - look here. Sorted. But that doesn’t mean I can be critical of what you write.
Now, you put a pretty heavy slant on what I said, and put words into my mouth in this article today. However, that’s no big deal - I am not going to pick apart every phrase you used - you’re entitled to your opinion. We move on. We have aired our opinions. It’s cool.
David. I await with bated breath for your inside story of what happened at Naked. Please, just fucking publish it an enlighten us all. Or are you still “waiting for something to happen”?
Yes Mike, you got it - I am waiting for something to happen.
And when it does happen, I’ll publish my story. Over and out.
David, I am wet with anticipation. No, really.