Guy Kawasaki's New Baby: Truemors

Uber-famous entrepreneur and venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki recently launched a new project, Truemors.com. His latest venture aims to open access to information and capitalize on user-generated content – namely rumors, news, and other tidbits. Anything seems to be fair game, aside from what Kawasaki & Co. deem to be “crap”. Wary of hypocrisy, Kawasaki closely monitors new submissions and deletes many yet retains quite a few questionable posts as well. (After all, self-promotion and grassroots buzz-building are part of what make ventures like Truemors work.) Few obstacles discourage potential submitters (the site does not require registration or email validation) and options for slinging dirt (via phone, text, email, or online) abound. Once posted, users can score posts in a Digg-like fashion. To date, the reception from the media and in the blogosphere has been decidedly mixed. Some point to the site’s clunky performance (load times can be slow and automatic page refreshes can get irritating) and uninspiring design and cry “dud” while others seem enamored by Kawasaki’s boldness and willingness to take a risk. Yet, as he himself frequently mentions in defense of Truemors, the site took only $12,000 to build — not much of a financial risk nor should any would-be entrepreneurs be surprised at how little it takes to launch a site in today’s market. I doubt he’s risking much personal capital either — at this point, most people inclined to have an opinion either consider him a genius or a lucky self-promoter. The site’s success or failure doesn’t seem likely to significantly change his image. From my perspective, Truemors is more interesting as a Web 2.0 exercise than in reality. If anything, its potential success may tell us something about ourselves – if we decide we really need another source for trifles like the details of Julie Bowen’s labor and childbirth (#9 on the “Greatest” list at the moment), Truemors will make sure we have it.