Meeteor.com has shut down

TL;DR - Meeteor.com has shut down.

We set out on a mission to define Social Networking 2.0 in late 2009. We saw Social Networking 1.0 as taking the friends you knew in real life, and adding them on a social network (Facebook or LinkedIn). In 2008, we saw a world where all that data aggregated online about us, could be leveraged to help us forge meaningful new relationships. How cool would it be if I could recommend a new friend for you to go skiing or golfing with, based on how much overlap you had in common (Friends, Schools, Hobbies, etc). Pretty cool, right?

Well, we launched exactly that service at Wharton in late 2009, and it didn't do so well. I remember our first launch so clearly: we had spent upwards of $200 on pizza to give out on campus in exchange for sign ups. The landing page didn't work in IE. It was buggy. Even with the bug fixes in place a few days later, our retention was horrible. People liked our matching, but ultimately wanted to use our service for professional networking: "Show me who the warmest possible person for me to talk to at Amazon is" was feedback we got over and over.

So began our endless journey through the trough of sorrow and the false wiggles of hope. Our most successful launch came right before SXSW last year. We saw that People Discovery was going to be the hot ticket, and we decided to launch a custom Meeteor for SXSW service, where users could sign up, and we'd connect them with the most relevant people for them to meet at the conference. Erin Griffith at PandoDaily broke the story. It was awesome. High Fives all around. Ultimately, it wasn't enough.

Over the course of three years (well, 39 months, but who's counting), we spoke to an endless number of users, prospective partners, friends, and our parents to try to get closer to product to market fit. Every day was exhilarating. Whether we were debating the right UX for a new feature or our marketing plan, our journey through the land of opportunity was full of thoughtful debate and challenges. I don't think a single one of us would trade our time at Meeteor for anything else. No regrets.

Most importantly, we were lucky to work with a strong team of insightful and experienced people who believed enough in our vision to give us their time, thoughts, money and expertise: Tom Matlack, Matt Gorin, Curtis Mo, Peter Secor, Chris Neumann, Leo Widrich, Pat Fitzgerald, Family, Friends, Fellow Entrepreneurs and our Users.

Thank you for trying our service.

Onwards,

Philip + Chris + Meleigha + Brandon