Sorry about that! I think the "Secure" copy is a bit misleading. We'll take that down.
What we meant to communicate with "Anonymous and Secure" is, "Feel free to be completely honest because we won't show this information to anyone else, and we won't even ask for your name or identity!"
It was a weekend project finished on little sleep. Sorry abou the "secure" bit.
Sorry for the confusion! We should be more clear about our intentions. We need write access so when you do get an invite, you can invite your friends to branches (via DM or @mention). But we'll never send anything without your explicit permission.
Loving this product. Especially the fact that you jump right into a lesson when you arrive at the homepage. Deliver value before asking the user for anything. Awesome.
I hear ya. I got inspired, I am working with an amazing team – a relentless backend engineer and ridiculously talented designer – and worst comes to worst I go back to school in a couple of years. I would always wonder "what could have been" if I passed this opportunity up, but if I fail at least I can say I learned a lot and gave it my best effort.
I won't argue with people who think I am crazy. That's a completely understandable deduction. What frustrates me are people who think I did it for the wrong reasons (i.e. $$$).
I worked for Scott at Meetup and can promise you that's the opposite of the truth. He's all about empowering people and communities, and disrupting traditional institutions. Read his full post on the page. He was making a prediction, not endorsing it.
If the quality of TechCrunch comments were higher would you think about it? I'd actually love to participate in an engaging discussion on AVC.com, for example. But when 200 people have commented, and 75% of them are tooting Fred's horn, it's no fun.
What we meant to communicate with "Anonymous and Secure" is, "Feel free to be completely honest because we won't show this information to anyone else, and we won't even ask for your name or identity!"
It was a weekend project finished on little sleep. Sorry abou the "secure" bit.