It must be niche social networking week. Following my review yesterday of Bakespace, a social networking site for people who like cooking, another interesting site hit my inbox: Respectance.
Respectance is a social networking site for online tributes, or as the email sent to me so nicely put it: “MySpace for dead people”. Respectance provides a space for family and friends to honor their dead loved ones by creating online tributes. Whilst similar tribute profiles do appear on MySpace or Facebook, Respectance differs by being dedicated entirely to the dead.
Respectance’s creators wanted to develop a dedicated and appropriate outlet for individuals to heal and share memories of their loved ones, while finding others with similar experiences. The site has also attracted fans that have created tribute sites for dead celebrities; Kurt Cobain and Ernest Hemingway are two examples.
The site (respectfully) does not run advertising; instead the business model focuses on charging for premium services.
Respectance was founded by Tom Wilkinson and Kazaa co-founder Richard Derks. The company has offices in San Francisco and Krakow, Poland and took funding of $250,000 from Dutch VC firm Solid Ventures in June.
