Karma lets you link multiple accounts - Airbnb, Facebook, Ebay, Etsy, etc - all to a single reputation profile to verify your good identity across the web. Interesting concept if they can get adoption for it - I would have loved the boost of letting someone see that I get good reviews elsewhere when trying to rent my first Airbnb (it was a long weekend for a large group of 20 somethings & I had no reviews yet).
They also have a Chrome extension that shows you people's Karma scores as you browse the web - the example they use is seeing scores on Craigslist, which would save me so much time & hassle... but assumes other users have opted in to system. The on-boarding actually suggests you ask people on Craigslist & elsewhere to sign up for Karma when doing business with them, which feels like it could work for big things (renting a house) but not so much for smaller ones (selling stuff for $50). Curious what their plans are to get more usage.
@ecetweets SUPER interesting, have had some conversations about this last week. "Who owns the reviews that are about YOU"? --> YOU should :)
Like you said the first time experience is where this will be most applicable, but the biggest obstacle is partnering with these platforms right? There's a similar service with 15M+ people in it - can't come up with the name... :(
Also apologies for not introducing myself @ecetweets. I'm one of the co-founders behind Karma and happy to answer any questions from you and the PH community.
@thegutrbal What strategies are you guys thinking of to gain adoption for this? And how would the extension work for sites like Craigslist where user's email addresses are generally obscured?
@ecetweets Taking the second part first, when someone who has installed the extension posts on Craigslist, the extension will prompt them to link that post to Karma. Then whenever another Karma user sees that post on Craigslist, they will see the original poster's Karma Score. On the other side, let's say you've found a bike you really like on CL but that person isn't using Karma. A "?" will appear next to that post instead of a Karma Score. You can then click on that question mark and the extension will prompt you with your unique invitation code, allowing you to copy and paste it into a Craigslist message saying, "I use Karma in order to make my Craigslist experiences safer, here's my Karma Score. Let me know what yours is once you sign up."
That second bit is one of the things we think about to drive adoption. As we being to scale, the majority of listings in search results of any of the platforms we support will return question marks, but allowing users to easily invite any of those people into the system will begin to turn that around. Think about the Airbnb host that has just received a request from a brand new user; the host can say, "You're interested in my place? Sign up for Karma so your reputation elsewhere can speak for you as a potential Airbnb guest."
One final thought on this matter and related to adoption. It seems as if the providers (hosts on Airbnb, drivers on Lyft, Rabbits on Task Rabbit, etc.) are the ones getting the shorter end of the stick as these platforms grow like wildfire. We believe that Karma can begin shifting that scale back in the provider's favor, allowing them to have their reputation power themselves as they sign onto new platforms going forward.
Love the UI/UX, great job!
Have you thought about implementing a Karma button feature? Similar to the Like button, I think it would be super useful if people could implement their Karma score on any HTML page. Not only this would probably increase engagement, it will allow people to vouch and see Karma even without the browser extension.
Or maybe I've missed that on the website?
Thanks @qruso! You can use the share pod on your Karma dashboard to share your public profile (your score, reviews, etc.) on FB, Twitter and Linkedin. Linking @framerate in regards to the Karma button feature; great idea!
Very cool! I just signed up. For one small bit of feedback, some of the Facebook analysis content could use a little tweaking - the assessment that "After analyzing your Facebook account, we found: You don't have many friends" seemed a little harsh :).
Thanks @spressto! Completely agree and thanks for catching this. Logged and will fix with the next push. The only excuse I can come up with in the first place is that @mikejstein didn't have his coffee that morning :)
@thegutrbal Haha, sounds good. And no worries. At ~1500 friends I'm not exactly a hermit, so that @mikejstein must be quite a popular guy.
Love the idea again, excited to see how it continues to evolve. Per the comment of @andythegiant happy to have a call sometime to explore how it might work for an online dating use case if it's useful. Cheers!
@livejamie in regards to Craigslist, it's less about connecting your account and more about linking a post you created through Craigslist to Karma with the extension, thereby allowing other Karma users to see your Karma Score when they check out your post. Also, try doing a search on Craigslist with the extension enabled. You should see Karma Scores on every single post - just know that as we begin to scale, most of those results will be question marks. When you click on that question mark however, the extension will allow you to invite them into the system saying that you use Karma to figure out how to transact better and safer on Craigslist.
We are big dog peeps here at Karma - our company mascot is Brock and is featured prominently on our About Us page. He's an adorable if somewhat temperamental Brussels Griffon who garners way too much of our attention. So yes, Rover is on our list of platforms we want to support :)
Really similar to https://traity.com/ what are the key differences?
EDIT: the extension seems good idea, also missing paypal identification... https://havekarma.com/u/chema quite ok! upvote ;)
Thanks @deambulando! As you noticed, the browser extension that allows users to seamlessly connect their accounts to Karma is part of what sets us apart. Saying that, we know this is a crowded space and believe that competition is healthy and can only promote an environment that allows people to begin to manage their reputation. We are supporters of the platforms that are trying to do likewise.
So it's like a Klout score for good people. A social currency of trustworthiness.
This is a pretty cool concept, and something that's sorely needed on the Internet. Now that reputation and Identity are becoming important components of many web sites (at least market places, social, professional forums), the ability to trust another entity comes from reviews, social proximity, and externally verified credibility.
The Day Zero problem is challenging, but it looks like some partnerships are already in place to mitigate that. Looking forward to trying it out.
Thanks @moxon! You pretty much nailed the idea. While we haven't built out any partnerships yet, we look forward to going forward.
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This is so important, particularly for Craigslist, which has no notion of reputation and, consequently, is rife with flaky behavior and worse. I want to know who I’m dealing with and also get credit for being a good citizen in my own interactions. (Disclosure: I am a company advisor, but only because I believe in what they’re doing.)
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