About.me
 | |
Type of site | Social directory |
|---|---|
| Created by | Tony Conrad, Ryan Freitas, Tim Young |
| Website |
about |
| Alexa rank |
 5,180 (August 2016) |
| Commercial | No |
| Registration | Yes |
| Current status | Active |
About.me (Usually styled as about.me) is a personal web hosting service co-founded by Ryan Freitas, Tony Conrad and Tim Young in October 2009.[1] The site offers registered users a simple platform from which to link multiple online identities, relevant external sites, and popular social networking websites such as Facebook, Flickr, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Twitter, Tumblr, and YouTube. It is characterized by its one-page user profiles, each with a large, often-artistic background image and abbreviated biography.
On December 20, 2010, just four days after its public launch, About.me was acquired by AOL.[2] The company remained at AOL for a little over twenty-five months. On February 5, 2013, it was announced that Conrad had bought back majority control of About.me from AOL; although no specifics were revealed on the purchase price, Conrad did say that it was a fraction of the price AOL paid to originally buy it. Conrad believed that there were no advantages in being owned by AOL, and that the site did not fit with AOL's current business model (which has emphasized online content rather than social networking services). The site returned to becoming a startup, and began another funding round following the announcement.[3]
Competition
Few sites can be listed as alternatives and competition to this market leader. branded.me is the closest one and is a webpage about you and as thus can be considered as a clone of about.me. It is mainly aimed at being a professional profile page and it is free as well. Another alternative is the website called medotcom.com which is different as it offers a search bar, live stats and addresses not only individuals but larger entities as well; it is free too and maybe the simplest and most straight forward of the three players with a focus on social media, online presence and getting discovered and being reached easily. There are also the famous flavors.me which had its sunny days and is still online. Finally, Wix.com can be seen as competition as well as it is free and enables you very easily to create your page and tell about you.
References
- ↑ "About.Me Launches with Ultimate Personal Domain Brand". Business Wire. 2010-12-09.
- ↑ "Newly Minted Social Identity Startup About.me Gets Acquired by AOL". SocialTimes. 2010-12-21.
- ↑ "About.me Buys Itself Back from AOL". Bits. The New York Times. 2013-02-05.