Branded Site Aggregator Nombray to Shut Down April 5th

Nombray, the project which looked to showcase all your individual or brand's destinations at a single URL, navigable by tabs, looks like it is going to find itself extinct as soon as April 5th, after the CEO was unable to complete the site's sale to a potential buyer at the end of 2009. Despite coverage from CNET, Lifehacker, Killer Startups and others upon its launch, the product apparently never gained the traction necessary to keep it going, although emphasis was on paid accounts with monthly subscriptions.

CEO Chris Lunt sent an e-mail today to users notifying them of the impending closure, saying the site was to shut down on Monday, April 5th, adding he wished "there was a different ending".

Nombray Will Be Gone for All Soon...

As I mentioned in my April 2009 coverage of Nombray, the site was very flexible, importing content from my various social media outposts along the Web and presenting them in one place - a site, which at least for the next two weeks, can be found here: http://www.nombray.com/users/305.

Lunt's note to customers spoke quickly of a potential buy that simply didn't pan out:

"I had arranged a buyer for Nombray in November, but after a long delay, they were unable to complete the deal. They could not marshal the necessary resources to run the business, and I find myself in the same position."

In the wake of Nombray's closing, Lunt pointed to alternatives, including Chi.mp and GizaPage.com. (Of note, I wasn't that big a fan of Chi.mp upon first glance at the end of 2008)

Sites come and go. Nombray no doubt had a hard time selling people on the benefits of a single site managed by their engine. The site is still up here: http://www.nombray.com/

After Monkeying Around, I'm Not Going Bananas for Chi.mp

Personal feed aggregators with social elements have been one of the more popular services to gain traction in 2008. With services like FriendFeed, Social Median, Strands, SocialThing, Profilactic and others all finding a niche, some larger than others, it's clear that people are looking to consolidate their online activities, and share the results with friends. One of the more odd attempts is that of chi.mp, which lets you have your own .mp "domain", and helps you build a personal page, connect with friends and add services. While it can be fun to think of interesting names that end with .mp (du.mp, clu.mp, pi.mp, ru.mp, bu.mp, bli.mp, stu.mp, thu.mp, ca.mp, sta.mp, pu.mp and forrestgu.mp all come to mind), the end result isn't all that compelling. Unless we are being measured by the sheer quantity of online services we register for, and by how many places we can connect to the same people, I don't really see the point.

Chi.mp calls itself a content hub and identity management platform. While its site is clean and its marketing well-intended, offering a "dashboard for your digital life", the end result turns out to be much less. While its user profiles look like they borrowed a page from Facebook, and the idea of aggregating feeds sounds like FriendFeed, it ends up instead being a cartoony version of an online business card that calls out only the most basic social services.


Adding Services Via Chi.mp Is Easy, But Limited
From the chi.mp dashboard, you can add some of the standard services, but not a huge number. And just because you add a service doesn't mean it's pulling in your data. I added Twitter when I signed up, and despite posting a few tweets, my new chi.mp site, hiding at techpu.mp, hasn't figured that out.

Looking at the chi.mp sites built by others shows pictures from Flickr and Facebook, and headlines of their RSS feeds. But there's no question that the service isn't going to take on the larger players. The pages are static and don't enable discussion. And no matter how many friends you discover on the site, you don't get alerts if you visit their pages. So now, I find myself getting hit with invitation requests from folks to become contacts on the site. It's clear I don't know why I would do it, and just maybe, they don't know either.

No wonder CNET quoted one observer back in April as saying, ""I'll tell you what Chi.mp is. It's venture money getting set on fire." Now, I'm usually happy to give new Web services a chance and see potential, but unless there is a major overhaul here to chi.mp, which would deliver greater service support, faster RSS pulls, and real social interaction, there's just no point. Now I feel like a monkey for even signing up.