Tuesday, November 27, 2007

SpiralFrog an Endangered Species

My favorite whipping boy, er amphibian, published its earnings report for its first quarter of being a publicly available site, and the numbers look like a biology class dissection gone horribly wrong.

The company spent more than $3 million and generated a piddling 20K of revenue.

Sure, they didn't publicly launch until a few weeks before the quarter ended, but the company is burning cash at a rate exceeded only by the national debt. With only $2 million left in the bank from its previous rounds of fooling, I mean fund raising, SpiralFrog is on its last leg (which may have to be sold off to French restaurant to stay afloat).

As I say again ad-supported music downloads is a bad idea, and 75 percent of the major labels figured that out long ago (sorry EMI).

We needed a Pets.com for the 21st century, and SpiralFrog is our winner.

Posted By John Gartner at 09:49 AM
Permanent Link: SpiralFrog an Endangered Species | Comments (1)

(1) Comments on SpiralFrog an Endangered Species

I use SpiralFrog and like the idea of ad-supported music downloads, John. I'm one of the "few who aren't already illegally downloading music" that you referenced in your article in August, 2006. I've found them to have a decent, though certainly not all-encompassing catalog. Their VCs appear to be taking an active interest in making the site work, as one contacted me to ask my opinion of the site after I had written an article on my weblog about it.

I can't argue with the numbers you quote, however, though I hope you are wrong in your prognosis. I like the idea that SpiralFrog is working on and I like their execution of it so far.

And as an aside, you've probably wrung the "on its last leg" gag for more than it was worth! :-)

Comments by Gary Petersen : Tuesday, November 27, 2007 at 09:09 PM

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