Posted by SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GSPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ OT BUZZ SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ on August 11, 19100 at 00:17:28:
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.SPINNER'S GOT BUZZ
By Peter D. Henig
Red Herring Online
July 30, 1998
Forget schmoozing -- Hollywood's all about buzz. And
when you've got it, you know it. Spinner.com's got it.
The two-year-old company could be the poster child for
Silicon Valley's new media startups.
But don't mistake it for the next Broadcast.com (BCST),
because this company's less like a radio broadcaster and
much more like your own private DJ -- and you don't
even need to throw a bar mitzvah.
While David Samuel, Spinner.com's founder and chief
executive officer, might look younger than his 26 years
would suggest, this Opie clone and future gazillionaire
knows exactly how to play Silicon Valley's tune. We sat
down for a chat at the Herring on Hollywood conference
in Santa Monica, where the buzz around Spinner was
turned up high.
Weddings and bar mitzvahs
Red Herring Online: Tell us about Spinner.com, and
then we'll get to how rich you're going to be.
David Samuel: (Laughs.) Spinner used to be
TheDJ.com. In junior high school I started a mobile disk
jockey service called Sounds Unlimited, and I built it up
through high school and college. I had two guys working
for me doing weddings and bar mitzvahs. It was fun.
Herring: So you started out as a DJ?
Samuel: Yep. Then I went to MIT, and then worked at
Oracle. So if you mix it all together, you've got
Spinner.com.
Herring: So it was like, poof, you had an epiphany, "I
want to start an Internet company?"
Samuel: Actually it was. I graduated in June 1994 from
MIT. I was supposed to stay there another year and do
my masters in electrical engineering, but Oracle's got this
great recruiting program so they flew us out to California
for a weekend. They've got a beautiful campus and we
had a great time, so I just decided to go to Oracle. And I
stayed there until February 1996.
But I remember the date distinctly, it was January 11,
1996. I had just started using [RealNetworks'] (RNWK)
RealAudio and I said, "Hey, we can do digital radio on
the Internet," and by February I'd left the company.
Herring: And that was it? You guys just quit?
Samuel: It's a typical Silicon Valley startup story. We
quit our jobs -- myself, my fraternity brother Steve Levis,
and my brother-in-law, Bryant Lewis -- and we had a
three-story house where we started TheDJ.com. The
basement was our office, we dropped an ISDN line in
there, and it was that way for about a year.
Herring: Ok, but how did you live, eat, pay rent, all of
that?
Samuel: We started shopping the idea around to some
of the Silicon Valley law firms, and we had a small nest
egg, some family money. It was really exciting. We
launched the service in 1996 and were already being
approached by several companiess to buy us out.
Herring: Buy what? You guys didn't even have a
business.
Samuel: We had five offer letters for an acquisition. I
can't tell you from whom, but it was in the seven-figure
range, which was amazing for us and really tempting
because we had only been in business for six months,
and we didn't even have any revenues.
Herring: It's almost ridiculous.
Samuel: And hard to turn down. But we felt we hadn't
really stood up yet, so we decided to go with a round of
financing. And I'm very glad we made that decision. We
got some more money from friends and family, and also
some from the CEO of one of the companies that
wanted to buy us out. That was our series A round. Then
in August 1997, Chris Anderson from Imagine Media
invested in us, which was our Series B, and then in April
of this year we closed our Series C round which was
several million dollars.
Herring: Who did that deal?
David Samuel: That was IDG Ventures, Arts Alliance,
Allen & Co., Bennett Media, and Phoenix Partners.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
Just spinning songs
Herring: You've got to be loving it. You have all this
attention, all this financing, and Broadcast.com (BCST)
just had the greatest single one-day rise of any IPO in
history. What's going through your head right now?
Samuel: We were pretty excited that Friday when we
watched what happened with Broadcast.com. But we're
different.
Herring: In exactly what way?
Samuel: Broadcast.com takes existing radio stations,
among other things, and broadcasts them over the
Internet. It's a great idea if you look at it from a local
news or sports perspective. But at Spinner we are
creating content and a service which is specifically for the
Internet, built from the ground up.
Herring: But admit it -- you guys are sounding more
and more like a radio station yourselves.
Samuel: We're just spinning songs, but because we
have the information right there at a viewer's fingertips,
then people can easily go in and get info about an artist
and also buy the CD if they want.
Herring: But I can't choose a specific song, it has to just
come up randomly through one of the channels, like the
blues channel, or top hits channel, or whatever. I can't
request a specific song?
Samuel: We have two blues channels actually. But, no,
you can't choose a specific song.
Herring: So right now it's just music. Are you going to
run ads soon?
Samuel: Well, we've got to make money to stay in
business, right?
Herring: We suppose, but isn't it a little like selling out?
Samuel: Look, we built this whole package. The client,
the server, the user interface, everything. We could easily
have 1,000 channels if we wanted to, that's what makes
it attractive, and advertisers like Amazon.com (AMZN)
are willing to pay, as well as give us a commission deal.
They also made a significant audio buy.
Herring: So now we're going to have to listen to
Amazon.com on Spinner.com.
Samuel: As long as we don't do too much advertising I
think people will be willing to accept it. And per hour,
we'll be doing a lot less than what currently exists now on
the radio.
the radio.
the radio.