clouin.com

Wikinvest Launches. Heads for Challenges

Wikinvest has just raised $2.5M from DCM and officially launched – although it’s been in
open beta for a few months now. In terms of features, on the plus side, the
shared stock chart is a sleek feature and a visual way to share facts and opinions
about stock trends. As far as I can tell, this is a nice differentiator. On the
minus side, the reputation system is interesting from an editorial standpoint,
but fails to enable readers to rate or track a contributor’s opinion (neutral,
bullish or bearish) in light of its past recommendations and successes. Hopefully,
they will fix this weakness, because it significantly reduces the value that
contributors would gain through their work on the wiki.

In terms of funding, $2.5M seems quite a bit of money, considering that Wikinvest currently
lacks technology assets or a user base. As far as content, Wikinvest counts
100,000 contributions. Wired hints that Wikinvest bootstrapped the content with
paid contributors. With only 250 contributors, so far, we’ll track their growth.
There are only so many free quality contributors for stock analysis. A case in point is the declining state of investor forums. Moreover, the long tail of investing is overcrowded, but Wikinvest might be able to offer a transition path to some investment newsletters, if they add a monetization path to the site. After all, giving away paid content for free - albeit in a pleasant format - is hardly a business model.