Kara Visits Mahalo
So I paid a visit to Jason Calacanis’s newest venture, Mahalo, in its nondescript warehouse office on the outskirts of downtown Santa Monica, Calif., on Friday.
We demoed the manic entrepreneur’s latest company, the “human-powered” search engine, at D5 this year. The venture was funded by–among others–Sequoia Capital and its wunderkind VC Roelof Botha.
The colorful Calacanis has been around the Web space for a long time, with a range of ventures back in the day, like “Silicon Alley Reporter,” up to the last of which–Weblogs Inc.–was sold to AOL in 2005 for $25 million.
He’s had Mahalo going since May, using funding he said will last for years to come, while he gets the service built into a highly targeted search site. While not everyone is rooting for Calacanis to succeed, and even calling him a self-promoter (which is so uncommon–not–in the Web industry), it will be interesting to see him try.
Oh, yes, Mahalo means “thanks” or “gratitude” in Hawaiian.
Here is the first video of my visit, one looking around the offices. And the second is in the post right below this one.
Comments
I don’t understand why anyone thinks this is interesting; seems like stupid idea to me.
And I especially don’t get why you’d feature it at ‘D’ and waste even more ink on it here.
Human-powered search is the equivalent of pedal-powered automobiles.
Posted by Mike Evangelist at July 17th, 2007 at 6:02 amOh, Mike, wasting ink is my focus in BoomTown, especially when there is NONE.
Ironic, no?
Now, pedal-powered automobiles? That, my friend, would be something to write about.
Posted by Kara Swisher at July 17th, 2007 at 1:40 pmThe venture capital game is clearly getting frothy again… or would that be irrational exuberance?
Scalability in search using humans? Isn’t that why About.com is NOT the number one search engine in use today? Don’t VCs do research anymore before investing?
Good luck with this investment. It will flame out long before their dedicated staff can index the internet’s offerings to accomodate all the search topics available today.
Posted by Mike Rowland at July 17th, 2007 at 1:44 pmOr until Jason can sell it!
Posted by Kara Swisher at July 18th, 2007 at 12:28 amIs it just me, or does the human-powered search ‘revolution’ evoke images of mice running on wheels to power the internet?
Wait- that’s a fantastic idea! Jason?
Posted by Dave Jeyes at July 19th, 2007 at 11:28 am