App.net, the pay-to-access social network, adds a free membership tier in ‘curated growth’ experiment

February 25, 2013 10:00 AM John Koetsier
John Koetsier

Earlier this month, founder Dalton Caldwell told me that people won't adopt a new social network just because it's good for them -- it needed to be "truly better." That's probably true -- but free is also good.

Dalton Caldwell on App.net: Six months later, more people are starting to ‘get it’

February 5, 2013 1:29 PM John Koetsier
John Koetsier

Editor's Pick Half a year ago, serial entrepreneur had a crazy idea: build a social network that people actually paid for. Now with App.net three times bigger than his goal, he looks back -- and ahead -- at what the service is, and will become.

Take that, Facebook: New social utility App.net blasts through $500K funding goal

August 12, 2012 6:02 PM John Koetsier
John Koetsier

Social sans commerce: here we come.

The new social utility that serial entrepreneur Dalton Caldwell started in response to being, in his words, screwed by Facebook, is live. App.net, which Caldwell ran a Kickstarter-ish campaign to fund, blew through its $500,000 goal and currently sits at $595,150.