Mister Wong

Mister Wong was one of the largest European free social bookmarking web services.[1]

Mister Wong
Type of site
Social bookmarking
URLwww.mister-wong.com
CommercialYes
RegistrationYes
LaunchedMarch 2006 (2006-03)
Current statusDefunct

History

The website was a German startup, established in 2006. Kai Tietjen had been running an ad agency for nearly a decade, when, in March 2006, he entered the field of web entrepreneurship[2] with the idea to "take on Google". Investing mostly his own money, he created a website that allows customers to bookmark their favorite sites, and then uses those bookmarks as the basic data for its search engine : to find a popular site, a user can search all other users' bookmarks.[3] The service ceased operation after being sold for €2500 in October 2016. [4]

The service was available in German, English, Russian, Chinese, Spanish and French.

Origin of name

The website extols its users to "Wong the Web!", a reference to the practice of Wonging, often employed by card counters in Blackjack.

Controversy

Mister Wong's original logo,[5] depicting a "cartoonish, nerdy East Asian man", brought on protests from many Asian-Americans.[6] The website's creator subsequently issued an apology and removed the logo.[7]

See also

Notes
  1. "Mister Wong company profile". CrunchBase.
  2. "Kai Tietjen, CEO & Founder of Construktiv", 2006
  3. "Creating Buzz (Without Hate Mail)", Newsweek, October 27, 2007
  4. "Mister Wong: Ehemaliger Social-Bookmarking-Star für 2.500 Euro verramscht". OnlineHändler News.de. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  5. flickr.com stored image
  6. "Mister Wong Isn't Laughing Anymore", Der Spiegel online in German
  7. A Message from the Founder, Kai Tietjen, July, 27 2007 Archived 2010-06-07 at the Wayback Machine
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