EXPERT SITES
Jonathan Glick, cofounder and CEO of WePick, a New York-based Web service that launches in May, wants to steal customers from his former employer. That's quite an ambitious goal, when you consider that Glick used to work forThe New York Times. WePick lets users create a team of "editors" to gather information on topics that interest them, creating a topical expert site that Glick believes will give newspapers a run for their money.
Visitors to WePick can start a "Pickteam" dedicated to any topic - gourmet vegetarian food, for example - and then recruit an edit team from friends and interested surfers. Team members use a browser add-on to select sites and pages they find relevant. Like newspaper staffs, WePick teams will have a hierarchy of editors, with each founder serving as the editor in chief and others serving as deputies. Editors who don't produce can lose their underlings to other managers.
In beta-testing the product, about 30 WePick employees and their friends created an editorial team dedicated to gathering news about technology. Within days, the team managed to aggregate and annotate hundreds of relevant stories. Soon, the competitive juices began to flow: "I was looking at CNET constantly," Glick says. "I wanted to make sure we were scooping them."
Teams can also earn money by making what amounts to mini ecommerce deals, scoring a small referral fee when a member links to a participating site. The kickbacks keep team members active, but they also raise questions about editorial integrity. Glick promises to label all sponsored picks and post the referral fees team members are earning. Also, team leaders can opt out of sponsored listings.
"You can decide that you just want to get money from banner advertising, and not take any ecommerce revenue," Glick says. "That makes it a fairly pure editorial team."
Team founders who choose to accept ecommerce deals can decide how the revenues are distributed among members. That makes WePick resemble multilevel marketing organizations such as Herbalife International.
"Well, you don't have to buy products and store them in your garage," says Glick. "WePick is more like a multilevel editorial organization."
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