Getting behind the virtual velvet rope.

August 29, 2007 4:35 AM

Invite Share. I've seen some invite sharing on MeTa, but this is another cool way to perhaps bump up your chances of getting an early invite to the latest exclusive, invite-only website a little sooner than later.
posted by allkindsoftime (24 comments total)

What is all this, anyway? I don't understand. It all looks like some kind of popularity pyramid scheme or something. Whatever all these invites are, I have a feeling I'd prefer to remain uninvited.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:41 AM on August 29, 2007

I have more pownce invites if MetaFilter people want them.
posted by chunking express at 4:43 AM on August 29, 2007

Did you feel the same way about gmail, flapjax?
posted by allkindsoftime at 4:43 AM on August 29, 2007

I want pownce please, chunking - email in profile.
posted by allkindsoftime at 4:44 AM on August 29, 2007

I've got a spare invitation to my second cousin's wedding if anyone wants it..
posted by HuronBob at 4:47 AM on August 29, 2007

Did you feel the same way about gmail, flapjax?

Man, I'm so out of all this stuff, I don't even know anything about gmail. I was never invited to gmail, I never knew one needed an invitation to gmail, I never had gmail... I just stumble through life, mostly ignorant of all this. And I'm not proud of it, actually, but that's just the way it is. Lots of web stuff, alas, just kinda passes me by. But I don't mean to rain on the parade, really I don't. I hope that everyone who wants to be behind the virtual velvet rope can get themselves behind the virtual velvet rope.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:57 AM on August 29, 2007

I agree about the country clubbiness of many of these <calligraphy>Invitation Only</calligraphy> sites, but, dude gmail. You have to use gmail. Gmail is more fundamental to the internets than TCP and IP combined. It's the Cadillac (and by that I mean Lexus) of webmail clients!
posted by DU at 5:05 AM on August 29, 2007

I've got a hundred gmail invites. I bet those can get me some cool stuff.
posted by vagabond at 5:06 AM on August 29, 2007

but, dude gmail. You have to use gmail.

Uh, okay... do you have, um, an invitation for me?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:07 AM on August 29, 2007

Done.
posted by DU at 5:09 AM on August 29, 2007

"find. flirt. bid." from the i'minlikewithyou site.

So, we meet, I like you, and then I can buy you?

Then... what?
posted by From Bklyn at 5:26 AM on August 29, 2007

Gmail is more fundamental to the internets than TCP and IP combined. It's the Cadillac (and by that I mean Lexus) of webmail clients!

If you like the idea of a company owning your data, trusting them to not shut the service down without notifying you, sure. Not everyone is that reckless, though.
posted by cmonkey at 5:27 AM on August 29, 2007 [2 favorites]

The only people that would be seriously inconvenienced by Google shutting of my service would be spammers who would get an extra few hundred bounces a day. I don't have a problem with Google "owning" all the jokes and idle chit-chat I store there.
posted by DU at 5:30 AM on August 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

What is all this, anyway? I don't understand. It all looks like some kind of popularity pyramid scheme or something. Whatever all these invites are, I have a feeling I'd prefer to remain uninvited.

I'm sure some of it is to generate "buzz". It encourages the services' adopters to send emails to all of their buddies advertising the service. I suspect that they think "invitations" feel less spammish than just plain promotional matterial.

It's also a way of controlling the flow of new users, rather like the $5 registration fee here. It makes it harder for bots to mass register and increases the odds that any given new users knows an existing user and is thus less likely to piss all over the service.

posted by Karmakaze at 5:45 AM on August 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

Anyone have desitorrents invites?
posted by horsemuth at 5:57 AM on August 29, 2007

Eh, I've got a membership with i'minlikewithyou, and it's no hell.

Think bidding on a person based on a question they ask, like "if you were going to a Renfaire, what would you dress up as?". Your bid also allows you to answer their question. Once the bidding is over, the asker then gets to pick who they want to contact from the top five bidders.

I get the impression it's really just a popularity contest, made concrete by the number of points bid on a particular person. It got old for me after a very short period of time. But then again, I have no patience whatsoever for popularity contests. YMMV.
posted by LN at 6:01 AM on August 29, 2007

I wish the inviteshare thing actually had descriptions for each of the sites they list, so I'd know if I even want to be invited.
posted by Zinger at 6:05 AM on August 29, 2007

Sounds like highschool. Highschool was not fun enough to go do again.
posted by From Bklyn at 6:11 AM on August 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

I wouldn't want to join any website that would have me as a member.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 6:14 AM on August 29, 2007 [2 favorites]

I wish the inviteshare thing actually had descriptions for each of the sites they list, so I'd know if I even want to be invited.

If you need a description, you obviously don't belong.
~contemptuously sips his trendy martini-du-jour and gazes lovingly at his Tim Biskup giclée print~
posted by Thorzdad at 6:17 AM on August 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

If you need a description, you obviously don't belong.

Yeah, okay, I opened the door for that one.

/slinks off to look up what giclée means
posted by Zinger at 6:25 AM on August 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

Does one still need an invitation to join gmail?

If you like the idea of a company owning your data, trusting them to not shut the service down without notifying you, sure. Not everyone is that reckless, though.

gmail is love.

Really, though, how many people have paid, private accounts with any kind of guarantee attached? Very few.
posted by zennie at 6:39 AM on August 29, 2007

Does one still need an invitation to join gmail?

Does one even have to hyperlink to gmail? I'm pretty certain that if you just think about it, your browser will go to it.
posted by item at 7:20 AM on August 29, 2007 [7 favorites]

I'm selling Metafilter invites for $10, if anybody wants one.
posted by designbot at 11:08 AM on August 29, 2007