Dopplr
Type of site
Social network service
Available inEnglish
CommercialYes
Launched2007
Current statusoffline

Dopplr was a free social networking service, launched in 2007,[1] that allowed users to create itineraries of their travel plans and spot correlations with their contacts' travel plans in order to arrange meetings at any point on their journey. Additional features included allowing the user to calculate the carbon footprint their journeys have produced. The site was named after Christian Doppler, discoverer of the Doppler effect. The company was based in the "Silicon Roundabout" area of London.

Notable staff

Investors

First-round angel investors in the site included Martin Varsavsky, Joichi Ito, Reid Hoffman, Saul Klein and Marko Ahtisaari. Second-round investors in fall 2008 were: Tom Glocer, Esther Dyson, Tyler Brûlé, Joshua Schachter, Yat Siu and Brian Behlendorf.[2]

Reception

A survey carried out in early 2008 on influential technology figures by the Guardian Media Group named Dopplr as a company to watch out for.[3] The Evening Standard named Matt Biddulph and Matt Jones, two of the site's founders, among the thousand most influential people in London in 2007[4] and again in 2008.[5]

Shutdown

On September 28, 2009, Dopplr announced that they had been acquired by Nokia.[6] Within a year questions were being raised as to the future of the site, with commentators noting that Dopplr's blog had not been updated since two days after the acquisition and its number of unique monthly users had dropped from 39,000 to 29,000.[7] In a statement issued in September 2010 a Nokia spokesperson reported "we have decided to bring it into a maintenance mode ... but will not develop it further at this stage."[7]

In October 2013, the front page was updated with an announcement that the service would close on 1 November 2013, which it subsequently did.

References

  1. ^ Bobbie Johnson (30 July 2007). "Dopplr.com". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 31 July 2008.
  2. ^ Matt Marshall (4 September 2007). "Dopplr, a trip-sharing site for the jet set". VentureBeat.com. Retrieved 31 July 2008.
  3. ^ Jemima Kiss (30 January 2008). "James Murdoch joint top in exec poll". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 31 July 2008.
  4. ^ "The 1000: London's Most Influential People 2007". Evening Standard. 29 November 2007. Archived from the original on 13 May 2008. Retrieved 31 July 2008.
  5. ^ "The 1000: London's Most Influential People 2008". Evening Standard. 8 October 2008. Archived from the original on 23 December 2008. Retrieved 11 October 2008.
  6. ^ Marko Ahtisaari (28 September 2009). "Nokia Acquires Dopplr". Archived from the original on 1 October 2009. Retrieved 28 September 2009.
  7. ^ a b Kiss, Jemima (10 September 2010). "The slow death of Dopplr". The Guardian. London.
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