Squidoo's Beginnings: A Look Back
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What Can We Learn from Squidoo's Early Years?
Squidoo, like all websites, has grown and changed tremendously, as commemorated by Seth Godin on its fifth anniversary. Some changes were unexpected, such as getting "hijacked by...stay at home moms and independent writers" (Seth Godin, '09). Others had their kernel way back at the start.
Each of us came to Squidoo with our own hazy vision, our own first impression, our own ideas about what Squidoo was about and what we'd do with it. Back in May '06, my vision was strongly shaped by the then-current "Everybody's an expert" Squidoo slogan.
Have you read the earliest Squidblog posts laying Squidoo's foundation? It's fascinating to see how it started!
Or check out the free ebook in which Seth first introduced the idea of a lens:
What's Changed? What's Different?
Hang on, it's your turn to be insightful and Seth-like! :)
Seth Godin planted a seed, offering a vision of what lenses might be like and what they could be used for. Then Squidoo grew up. Of course, no website is ever exactly like its founders imagined it would be. With the advantage of hindsight, let's look back and consider the original blueprint versus how it turned out:
What parts of Seth's vision are still around? Or what's new?
Fetching blurbs now... please stand byHere's a good idea Seth had at the very start that still holds true.
skiesgreen says:
The opportunity to express one's uniqueness and knowledge in a lens is a great attribute of Squidoo and what makes it so addictive. One can't help building onto that first experience and joining up with the thousands of like minded beings that call Squidoo home. It is one part of Seth's vision that is there for the life of it.
Posted April 18, 2011
katiecolette says:
I think website simplicity that Seth talks about in his books is still around. Squidoo is easy to use and is reader-oriented. And I do agree with Lisa, Squidoo is still very useful, unique, and updated.
Posted April 07, 2011
Greekgeek says:
Creating webpages that help us (by earning something), help users (with our content) and earn money for charity: that's a three-part function of lenses that Seth envisioned at the start which I'm glad still holds true!
Posted April 06, 2011
makingamark says:
This would be my choice "We've built a platform that makes it easy for anyone, even a newbie, to teach people about topics they care about. We believe that everyone is an expert about something, and the Squidoo.com platform is designed to make it easy to do that."
Posted April 06, 2011
LisaAuch says:
Unique Useful, updated, It is what I remember from the beginning and still ringing true every time I look for a new idea for a lens
Posted April 06, 2011
Here's a great use of Squidoo or an approach to lenses that arose later.
Flynn_the_Cat says:
Probably 95% of the lensmasters are new! And they're the people who actually made the place work!
Posted April 07, 2011
The First Lenses on Squidoo in 2005
The Squidoo Homepage (squidoo.com) on 7th Dec, '05:
On December 7, 2005, Squidoo entered true beta, replacing the original "email us if you're interested" message with the splash screen above. So simple: all of Squidoo in two big shiny buttons!
Those early adapters were busy. They quickly created 3000+ lenses and started earning money. By the next day, they had created another thousand lenses. By that time, Squidoo had earned a grand total of $64.45. Woo hoo! Nowadays a lens can earn that much in a day, with commissions. But I'm speaking of something that came later: money-earning. During Beta, earnings went to charity.
Instead of creating money-earning lenses, lensmasters were simply being experts and curators of expert content. The idea of "lens" was new, and people were experimenting with what a "lens" could be. There was no thought of SEO or affiliate marketing or the social web (which was still fairly new). Many lenses were enhanced business cards or or lists of interesting links on a single subject. In fact, they remind me very much of the early, non-commercial web circa 1993. Check out some of these early lenses:
Squidoo Top 100 Lenses on December 10, 2005
Squidoo Top 100 Lenses on December 17, 2005
Recognize anybody? I see the usual suspects (Squid Team members), Chris Anderson of WIRED magazine explaining his landmark theory of the Long Tail, Martha Stewart's Kitchen sharing cookie recipes, and Jane Goodall-- yes, THAT Jane Goodall! explaining her ideas about hope.
Did you join Squidoo while it was still in Beta?
I know there's a few of those early birds still around...
Poll time! Let's take a head count.
Fetching blurbs now... please stand byI joined Squidoo while it was in BETA!
genglo says:
Yes! I signed up immediately after listening to a presentation by Seth Godin. I had no clue what I was signing up for, but I'm glad I did.
Posted August 14, 2011
No, I joined later. Here's my join date!
COUNTRYLUTHIER says:
December 2007, brother squid can you spare a dime? My first lens was three years later. Yes I missed the thundering (Note to self: do squids thunder?) or galloping herd of squids or do they travel in pods, I digress, yepper missed the Beta, I'm mighty proud to be here now though! Thanks for sharing this bit o squidoo history.
Posted September 23, 2011
Mickie_G says:
I remember the "cloud' form of popular tags. Those were around when I found Squidoo. I joined May 26, 2006. When did it get out of beta? (is that further down the page?)
Posted July 01, 2011
skiesgreen says:
My time here started at the end of 2008 and it took a while before I started doing many lenses, so I missed all the early days stuff but boy has it grown since then.
Posted April 18, 2011
Sammie says:
I joined in September 2006. It's been amazing seeing how much it's grown and changed since then.
Posted April 15, 2011
Squidoo in 2006: The Vision Takes Root
Here's Squidoo.com's splash page on March 29, 2006:
Three months later, Squidoo was coming along nicely. Its homepage changed to this design, featuring random lensmasters-- there were no Giants-- and, as far as I can tell, nine random lenses. Notice the title: "Nine Things You Didn't Know." The "everyone's an expert (on something)" paradigm was in full flower.
By June 2006, Squidoo had 30,000 lenses. People were earning money from Amazon and other "selling stuff" modules, as well as Google Adsense distributed evenly (I think?) across all lenses. See Squidoo's vague-as-ever payment FAQ in August 2006. But these earnings were only a few pennies a month, unless you made some "selling stuff" module commissions. Being a Squid back then was a labor of love.
Here's Megan Casey summing up lensmaster Katherine Tyrrell on what a lens was all about in 2006. Yes, that's makingamark, still active in SquidU! Also check out Megan's Squidblog post describing lenses as books.
In August, the Squidblog announced the Citizen Squids, experienced lensmasters who were officially recognized as mentors and helpers in the Squid community. Some were moderators of SquidU.
Lenses of the Year, Squidoo 2006
The Best Lenses, As Chosen By Members, Were Informational
Right: Squidoo Logo from March 2006, from a fascinating interview with Squidoo's original Director of Community Development, Heath Row.Lens of the Day started in February, chosen at random by the Squidteam. In early 2007, Squidoo held a contest, inviting Squidoo members to vote on 100 LOTDs to choose the 2006 Lens of the Year. See that lens for Seth's announcement and year wrap-up.
Here are the Winners of the 2006 Squidoo Lens of the Year Vote:
- First Place: Thirteen Days in October: The Cuban Missile Crisis
- Second Place: Starlings in the Family
- Third Place: Stained Glass Windows
- Runner Up: Michelangelo's David
- Runer Up: Save Lives in Africa
Apart from "Stained Glass Windows," these are informational lenses, and two earn money for charity.
Squidoo in 2007: Growing Up & Growing Pains
Here's Squidoo.com on May 4, 2007, the day I joined:
Squidoo looked like this for a quite a long time. Compare the definition of Squidoo in this screenshot to the last one. Blurbs like that set the expectation of new arrivals.
Check out the Squidoo FAQ from back then. So simple, so free, so innocent! Squidoo was about to receive an unhappy wake-up call.
Also, because I'm vain, here's what Ancient Greece Odyssey looked like when I first composed it, with Squidoo's original theme.
See how clean and uncluttered it was? There were almost no ads, so pages were very easy on the eyes, but on the other hand not much revenue. It earned a top tier payout of $3.80 in July. It now pulls in $30+ a month.
See those Squidoo Offers on the side? Not understanding anything about marketing, I wasted $100 on one and got almost no traffic from it! It took me all of 2007 on Squidoo to make that money back. After that, I started learning about SEO so as to design pages that attracted traffic on their own without having to sink money into advertising!
Squidoo Gets Slapped: July 2007
The Inevitable Fall From Innocence
Oops.
In the first week of July, Squidoo got hit with spammers and suffered the infamous "Squidoo slap" from Google. Seth Godin posted about it on the SquidBlog. HQ quickly had to enact spam-fighting filters and disable iframes which were being abused. Also, Squidoo had to enact Squiddont Policies banning junk-prone topics that the spammers had flooded Squidoo with using a fire hose. At the end of the month, editor-in-chief Megan Casey had to issue the first "play nice, people" SquidHQ announcement condemning ratings swaps.
Various bloggers smugly declared Squidoo dead from the "Google Squidoo Slap" and pronounced its postmortem. Those of us who were actually here saw traffic dip in July and August and then bounce back and exceed former levels. Life in Squidland went on.
Â
Google Squidoo Slap, Summer '07
Traffic Stats from my Ancient Greece Odyssey lens:
The episode had temporary direct consequences for Squidoo members, but it continues to shape Squidoo's proactive policy in clamping down on anything that Google might penalize. Because of lessons learned in '07, Squidoo rode out Google's Farmer Update in Feb 2011 with no impact and unrolled more aggressive duplicate content filters (even if it's your own content posted somewhere else) to stay ahead of the rolling boulder.
Squidoo 2007: Other Important Developments
Giant Program, Co-Brands and More
In 2007, lenses started really making money: that's when the Squidoo Tier Payout System began. (See that link for a month-by-month chart of Squidoo tier payouts going all the way back). People were experimenting with many different kinds of lenses. Sales lenses, educational lenses, charity lenses, personal experience lenses... there was a whole gamut.Another hugely important development was the original Giant Squid challenge in 2007. Having started in May, I couldn't pull it off: you had to build one hundred quality lenses (dropped to 50, because that was too danged hard) by the end of August to qualify.
Squidoo co-brands also began appearing in 2007: Squidwho, SquidLit, the Ever project, e.g.
Once again, there was a Lens of the Year contest. I think the Lens of the Year contest and its successors teach us a lot about how Squidoo has grown and changed.
Check out the winners of the 2007 Squidoo Lens of the Year Contest. This year, Squidoo Angels -- volunteer community members -- nominated candidates (i.e. they weren't picked by SquidHQ's Lens of the Day column), and then the whole community voted on them.
Notice the repeat runner-up from 2006: Michaelangelo's David. That lens enormously influenced me on what I thought Squidoo was for and about.
Squidoo 2008: Attack of the Giant Squids
Squidoo Undergoes Several Sea Changes
Some cosmetic yet profound changes happened to Squidoo's default appearance. Compare Squidoo's Default Skin 2007 to Squidoo's default skin in 2008. The Wayback Machine doesn't record one major change: more advertising in the sidebar, including animated "glam ads," and more Adsense in the header and footer. This made Squidoo look less like Wikipedia and About.com and more like a...well, a commercial Web 2.0 site with lots of advertising.Another profound change was the expansion of the Giant Squid Program. We could now become Giants with 50 quality lenses. New Giant deadlines were offered almost quarterly. Most importantly, SquidHQ appointed Giant Squid Organizers to develop the program in new ways. The original GSOs were Bonnie, Robin, Gypsypirate and myself, but I had to bow out quickly -- I couldn't keep up! Bonnie and Robin (with Kimberly and Megan advising and assisting) have apparently cloned themselves, because there's no way they could be doing all the stuff they do.
Giant Squid Organizers not only organized the Giant Squid program; they focused the Squidoo community with various projects. They shared tips and lensmaking suggestions. They created challenges and projects to inspire lensmasters to make lenses. They featured outstanding Giant Squid lenses in their Community Showcase blog, later revamped to feature Purple Star lenses. At first, purple stars were a special award given exclusively to Giant lenses selected by the Organizers from member nominations. In October '08, Giant Squid Greeters were appointed to help mentor and answer questions, like citizen Squids before.
These changes promoted, recognized, and nurtured numerous Squidoo activities and lensmasters, but also caused (or perhaps simply reflected) some philosophical changes on what Squidoo was all about. It seems to me that at that point, Squidoo began to be presented a a social community focused on themed projects and challenges rather than as an information archive where "everyone's an expert (on something)."
Giant Squid Awards 2008
There Were So Many Lenses Now, We Had Award Categories
Significantly, instead of having a Lens of the Year Award, for the 2008 wrap-up, we had Giant Squid Awards instead. Awards were now given out by categories.I am not certain whether these categories reflect the tastes of the Giant Squid Organizers or the changing demographics of the Squidoo community, but I was surprised to see a different emphasis in the types of lenses recognized in 2008 compared to previous years. It looked to me as if our concept of a typical lens had changed.
Some of the lenses that had won "Lens of the Year" in 2006 and 2007 would not have found a place in the categories recognized by the 2008 awards: Baking, Celebrities, Charity (a nice addition, although there had been charity lenses awarded before), Cooking (separate from baking), Crafty, DIY, Gaming, Green, History, Holiday, Humor, Music, Party, Pet, Pop Culture (separate from celebrity), Shopping, Sports, How-To, Tech, Travel, Lensography, and Giant Squid of the Year. (These categories were kept for 2009 Awards, with the addition of "About Me" lenses).
When we single out certain lenses, categories, projects, members, or aspects of Squidoo for recognition, we're nurturing parts of Squidoo, which is a net gain. But inevitably, other parts fall through the cracks. it's a fact of every website; it's just something to keep in mind.
Recent Developments on Squidoo
And an important question!
The Monster Program was added in fall of 2010 as a way to introduce newbies to parts of Squidoo gradually, "unlocking" various features via a game and giving people "quests" inspiring them to adopt good lensbuilding practices and explore different parts of Squidoo. Points are a fun benchmark to show you're making progress, until your efforts begin to accumulate more tangible signs of progress which take longer to come by: visitors, money, clickouts.For years now, Squidoo has added (and sometimes subtracted) organizers, greeters, mentors, clubs, groups, co-brands, incentives, programs, awards, and "progress" indicators to help guide members on the path to making lenses. They've tried to balance benefits for and recognition of experienced lensmasters with encouragement and recognition of newbies. Lots of emphasis is placed on the Squidoo community. Organizers and HQ can't do everything, so at times, it seems like less emphasis has been placed on content, site infrastructure and lenses than on community activities. I think lately the pendulum has begun to swing back.
Paradoxically, with all these exciting things going on, one can almost lose track of the primary purpose of Squidoo: making lenses. And we're still faced with the challenge Seth Godin set us in the first place when he coined the term. In order to build lenses, we need to figure out...
What Is a Lens?
Everybody Will Have a Different Answer
Obviously, the definition of "Squidoo lens" has changed and expanded since the early days. It's unfolded in ways that Seth Godin and his original team couldn't have anticipated.
But despite the games, the rise of social communities, the integration of Facebook and Twitter, and a lot more advertising, Squidoo still remains, primarily, a site for publishing lenses.
So, what is a lens? Every single one of us will have a different definition, or several. I think as a lensmaster, it would help every one of us to write down what, exactly, we think a lens is, and what it's for. Revisit the question every year or so and see how your own views change.
Question: What Is A Lens? (Note: This form is just for this question... there's also a guestbook at the bottom of the page for more general comments and observations! )
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Mickie_G Jul 1, 2011 @ 3:25 pm | delete
- A lens is about focus--something that I am getting better at doing. (Still not perfect, but working on it. What is perfect focus? 20/20?) Zoom in on the details and go from there to create more lenses.
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greenlife17
Apr 24, 2011 @ 8:46 am | delete
- a mirror, a retrospect, of what you've been through that's worth sharing to others. we write because not all person experienced what we've experienced, and we didn't experienced what they've been through. it's a circle in the learning process. you must give what you have received for others to learn too.
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skiesgreen
Apr 18, 2011 @ 5:06 pm | delete
- This is a great record of Squidoo and much appreciated. Looking back over it shows that people respond to quality and there is certianly a lot of that here. Featured this on Squidoo Knowledge Extra
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hunksparrow
Apr 15, 2011 @ 12:41 pm | delete
- A lens is my view on what's important to me that I want to share with others. I came to squidoo because it was free and I could put anything I wanted on a page (lens), while maybe making a few bucks. I quickly realized Squidoo is a great community and crafting lenses is addictive--but fun. I wish I would have started Squidoo earlier.
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MelissaInTheSky
Apr 15, 2011 @ 6:41 am | delete
- Great lens!
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Some of My Other Squidoo-Related Lenses
Hopefully helpful...
Guestbook
Thanks So Much for Dropping By
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whiteskyline
Sep 6, 2011 @ 9:19 am | delete
- I can't believe what they looked like in 2005.
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genglo
Aug 14, 2011 @ 2:30 pm | delete
- I enjoyed this look back.
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Mickie_G Jul 1, 2011 @ 3:30 pm | delete
- As usual, a wonderful lens. I had forgotten how Squidoo used to look. I have tried blogging and hubbing, but I still find the format at Squidoo the easiest to use. It also lets me "focus" on different areas that I find interesting. This historical piece that you have written makes me remember why hand how I am here. I might not be in the top 100 lensmasters, but I am still here.
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GayleMcLaughlin
Jun 30, 2011 @ 7:46 am | delete
- It is really interesting to see how Squidoo developed. I was an early contributor on Ehow--but I wish I had known about Squidoo then!
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yourgoldenfuture
Apr 17, 2011 @ 1:13 pm | delete
- very interesting infos on the back-times
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by Greekgeek
Storyteller, fomer Latin teacher, student of mythology and the ancient world: I've worn many hats, but always I've dabbled in computers and the web.
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And Here's What I Got Out of It
