Wednesday, January 7, 2009

CitySpeek Takes On Microblogging, Twitter

Portland-based CitySpeek is looking to take the micro blogging made popular by Twitter, and adding features such as private groups, photos and video, and categories. The startup, which is soft launching this week, said that it will provide 140-character, micro-messaging services, targeted at English speaking Internet users not currently on Twitter. The startup is being bootstrapped by co-founders Jeff Martens and Jeremiah Kaster Reams. The firm told Northwest Innovation that the firm is likely looking to raise an angel round of funding in the next 4-6 months. Among other features of the messaging service, the firm also allows users to integrate with such Web services as Flickr--and to cross post into Twitter.