August 18, 2011 | Read Time: 3 minutes
So, perhaps Jumo turned out too good to be true.
But at least Chris Hughes, the Facebook co-founder, political-campaign wunderkind and Web entrepreneur, tried.
His dream to build a social network to help people interact with nonprofit organizations became Jumo, the much-publicized Web site that started late last year. The network’s name captured its ambitious global aspirations: It means “together in concert” in Yoruba, a West African language.
But since its debut, no one in or out of the nonprofit world seemed to have been paying attention to it.
And now Jumo has been bought by Good Worldwide, a for-profit magazine and nonprofit consulting firm, for an undisclosed amount. Some reports say it was sold for nothing and that the deal was described as an acquisition so that Mr. Hughes could save face on a venture that didn’t quite take hold. “The partnership is more of a symbolic marriage than a business deal,” according to Betabeat.com.
Mr. Hughes refutes that assertion. “That’s plainly false. We’ve said it publicly and corrected that.”
He declined to provide further details of the transaction, although the deal will still have to be approved by New York’s attorney general, since the nonprofit’s assets will be transferred to a for-profit. At issue, too, is how the $3.5-million in grants provided to Jumo by three prominent foundations–the Ford Foundation, the Omidyar Network, and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation—will be considered and assessed, The New York Times notes.
That is not expected to be a problem, Mr. Hughes says. “Every single one of our foundation supporters has been supportive of this deal.”
He adds that Jumo’s board unanimously approved, too. “They understood the power behind how a Good-Jumo team would look like.”
Talks about a merger got serious this summer as Mr. Hughes was looking for “an unlimited supply of good content” and Good sought ways to expand its social-networking capabilities, according to Fast Company. Good also has 3 million monthly visitors, while Jumo has slightly more than 1 million people using its site, which features profiles of about 15,000 nonprofit groups.
Though Jumo never set out to be an online fund-raising platform, people could still donate through the portal for a nonprofit, and the site itself has raised some money for a cause.
Recently, a campaign by Jumo to raise money for groups working to relieve the Somalia famine brought in $17,000 from more than 400 Jumo donors, Mr. Hughes says. “The campaign was a testament to our community, their willingness and ability to stand up and support in time of need.”
The news of the social network being swallowed by a content provider was greeted with a thud on Twitter.
Mr. Hughes says he’ll be joining Good as a senior adviser. Asked whether Jumo is a failed startup, Mr. Hughes responded: “Absolutely not. We’ve been on a really strong run since we put out our initial product. I’ve been incredibly proud of the work we’ve done.”
