History
Timeline
Financials
Technology
Reception
5.1 Accusations of copyright infringement
5.2 Controversies
Supported file formats
See also
References
External links
History
The idea for Scribd was originally inspired when Trip Adler was at Harvard and h
ad a conversation with his father, John R. Adler, about the difficulties of publ
ishing academic papers. He teamed up with co-founders Jared Friedman and Tikhon
Bernstamm and they attended Y Combinator in Cambridge in the summer of 2006.[5]
Scribd was launched from a San Francisco apartment in March 2007 and quickly gre
w in traffic. In 2008, it ranked as one of the top 20 social media sites accordi
ng to Comscore.[6] In June 2009, Scribd launched Scribd Store[7] and shortly the
reafter closed a deal with Simon & Schuster to sell ebooks on Scribd.[8] Over 90
0 publishers, including HarperCollins, Harvard University Press, Houghton Miffli
n Harcourt, Wiley, Pearson, Random House, RosettaBooks, Stanford University Pres
s, and Workman, are now[when?] associated with Scribd.[citation needed] ProQuest
began publishing dissertations and theses on Scribd in December 2009.[citation
needed]
In October 2009, Scribd launched its branded reader for media companies with The
New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Huffington Post, TechCr
unch, and MediaBistro.[9] Over 100 media companies now use Scribd s branded reader
to embed source material into their stories. In August 2010, news stories began
to break and documents and books began to go viral on Scribd including the over
turned Prop 8 and HP s lawsuit against Mark Hurd s move to Oracle Corporation.[citat
ion needed]
In October 2013, Scribd officially launched the first unlimited access subscript
ion service for digital books, often called the "Netflix for ebooks",[10] giving
readers unlimited access to Scribd library.[11] The company also announced a pa
rtnership with major publishing company HarperCollins.[2] The official statement
revealed that the "majority" of the HarperCollins US and HarperCollins Christia
n catalogs will be available in Scribd's subscription service. Chantal Restivo-A
lessi, chief digital officer at HarperCollins, explained to the media that the d
eal represents the first time that the publisher has released such a large porti
on of its catalog.[12]
As of December 2013, Adler is the CEO of Scribd, where he is responsible for the
product and strategic direction of the company. Adler was named in BusinessWeek
's "Best Young Tech Entrepreneurs 2010" list.[13]
In January 2015, the company raised $22 million in new funding from Khosla Ventu
res with partner Keith Rabois joining the Scribd board of directors.[14]
Timeline
In February
phones.[15]
hich allows
April 2010,
Facebook f8
2010, Scribd unveiled its first mobile plans for e-readers and smart
In April 2010 Scribd launched a new feature called "Readcast",[16] w
automatic sharing of documents on Facebook and Twitter.[17] Also in
Scribd announced its integration of Facebook social plug-ins at the
Developer Conference.[18]
Scribd rolled out a redesign on September 13, 2010 to become, according to TechC
runch, "the social network for reading".[19]
In October 2013, Scribd launched its ebook subscription service, allowing reader
s to pay a flat monthly fee in exchange for unlimited access to all of Scribd's
book titles.[20]
Financials
The company was initially funded with US$12,000 from Y Combinator, and received
over US$3.7 million in June 2007 from Redpoint Ventures and The Kinsey Hills Gro
up.[21][22] In December 2008, the company raised US$9 million in a second round
of funding, led by Charles River Ventures with re-investment from Redpoint Ventu
res and Kinsey Hills Group, and hired as president George Consagra, former Bebo
COO and managing director of Organic Inc.[23] Consagra left Scribd and became CE
O of Good Guide in August 2010.
David O. Sacks, former PayPal COO and founder of Yammer and Geni, joined Scribd s
board of directors in January 2010. In January 2011, Scribd raised its largest r
ound, bringing in an additional $13M. The latest round was led by MLC Investment
In September 2009, American author Elaine Scott alleged that Scribd "shamelessly
profits from the stolen copyrighted works of innumerable authors."[36] Her atto
rneys Joe Sibley and Kiwi Camara sought class action status in their efforts to
win damages from Scribd for allegedly "egregious copyright infringement."[37][38
] On May 11, 2009, Motoko Rich, writing in the New York Times, reported on Scrib
d's hosting of pirated works. Sibley Camara filed a class action lawsuit against
Scribd, accusing it of calculated copyright infringement for profit.[39] The su
it was dropped in July 2010.[40][41]
In 2007, one year after its inception, Scribd was served with 25 Digital Millenn
ium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown notices.[42] The total number of DMCA notices
that have been served to the company is unknown, but, on 8 January 2013, a singl
e author Steven Saylor notified Scribd of 17 unauthorized uploads of his copyrig
hted work.[43]
Controversies
In March 2009, the passwords of several Comcast customers were leaked on Scribd.
The passwords were later removed when the news was published by The New York Ti
mes.[44][45][46]
In July 2010, GigaOM reported that the script of The Social Network (2010) movie
was uploaded and leaked on Scribd; it was promptly taken down per Sony s DMCA req
uest.[47]
Following a decision of the Istanbul 12th Criminal Court of Peace, dated 8 March
2013, access to Scribd is blocked for Internet users in Turkey.[48]
Supported file formats
Supported formats include:[49]
Microsoft Excel (.xls, .xlsx)
Microsoft PowerPoint (.ppt, .pps, .pptx, .ppsx)
Microsoft Word (.doc, .docx)
OpenDocument (.odt, .odp, .ods, .odf, .odg)
OpenOffice.org XML (.sxw, .sxi, .sxc, .sxd)
Plain text (.txt)
Portable Document Format (.pdf)
PostScript (.ps)
Rich text format (.rtf)
Tagged image file format (.tif, .tiff)
See also
Document collaboration
Wayback Machine
Webcite
References
"Scribd.com Site Info". Alexa Internet. Retrieved 2014-12-02.
Julie Bosman (October 1, 2013). "HarperCollins Joins Scribd in E-Book Subscr
iption Plan". Retrieved December 8, 2013.
Holmes, David (2013-11-18). "What does achieving a big milestone get you at
Scribd? An equally big office perk.". Pando.com. Retrieved 2013-12-30.
Scribd adds unlimited audiobooks to its $8.99 subscription ebook service
"Scribd". Crunchbase.com. Retrieved 2013-12-30.
"Scribd had a blowout year and so did the web document".
Brad Stone (17 May 2009). "Site Lets Writers Sell Digital Copies". The New Y
ork Times. Retrieved 11 October 2010.
Brad Stone (11 July 2009). "Simon & Schuster to Sell Digital Books on Scribd
Stone, Brad (29 March 2009). "passwords of comcast customers exposed". nytim
es.com. Retrieved 1 January 2010.
"Comcast passwords leaked onto the web". cnet.com. 29 March 2009. Retrieved
1 January 2010.
"Comcast passwords exposed". hothardware.com. 29 March 2009. Retrieved 1 Jan
uary 2010.
Gannes, Liz. "Leaked Facebook Movie Script Paints Zuckerberg as Vindictive a
nd Naive". Gigaom.
"Freedom on the Net
Turkey 2013". Freedom House. Retrieved October 3, 2013.
Jason (February 26, 2009). "Info, FAQs, and Forums/FAQ: Writing, Uploading a
nd Managing Documents". Retrieved October 11, 2010.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Scribd.
Official website
Video: 'YouTube' for writers
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