Wetpaint raises $9.5M for consumer wikis, meanwhile Jot is absent
Wetpaint, the Seattle start-up that lets people build Wikis — or sites where multiple people can edit the same pages — has raised $9.5 million to grab more market share.
The move comes after Google bought popular Wiki site, Jotspot, last year and closed that company to new users. VentureBeat tried out various Wikis last year, and found Jotspot the most intuitive. Wetpaint is easy to use, but we didn’t like the loud advertising present on the site — so passed on using it. But with Jotspot gone for now (presumably, Google will relaunch it in some fashion), and players like Socialtext increasingly focused on selling its wiki software to company users, Wetpaint is among the more convenient Wiki softwares for individual projects.
The question is whether $9.5 million is really necessary for a software that is so cheap to make and distribute. It had already raised $5.25 million (past coverage here).
Wetpaint told VentureBeat its users have generated more than 150,000 Wikis in six months, and that the company has struck partnerships with big media companies. AOL, ABC, CBS, American Express Publishing, T-Mobile and HTC have created community sites for their active users, though it’s uncertain how lucrative these deals will be.
Accel Partners, backers of Facebook and Glam, two other sites that rely on advertising for their business model, led the new investment. Existing investors Trinity Ventures and Frazier Technology Ventures joined the investment.
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About the Author, Matt Marshall
Matt launched VentureBeat in September of 2006, with the realization that no one else was covering the entrepreneurial and tech innovation scene with the velocity or depth that he was. Prior to founding VentureBeat, he covered venture capital for the San Jose Mercury News from 2001 to 2006. In 2002, Matt was awarded "Journalist of the Year" by the Northern California Society of Professional Journalists. Prior to working at the Merc, he was a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal in Bonn, Germany from 1995 to 1998, and a writer for the Washington Post in 1994. Matt holds a PhD in Government and an MA in German and European Studies from Georgetown University. In addition to VentureBeat, Matt is also the Executive Producer of DEMO, the leading launchpad event for emerging technologies.
