If you have been chillin’ on Pinterest in the last few days, you might have seen a comment that caught your attention.
It typically reads, “This looks great! I am going to repost this on Pinspire… if this is ok with you!”.
What seems like a friendly stat boosting referral, is actually a second “pin” style site recently created in Europe. It’s called Pinspire, and the resemblances are uncanny.
First, let’s take a look at the typical front page of Pinterest.
Swapping now over to Pinspire, you see can see the similarities are more than just coincidence.
Pinspire is based out of Germany, and offers users the ability to view its site in several countries and languages. (You can view the US version here.) Copyright legality issues aside, it too seems to be a popular site for finding creativity and inspiration. And with more than 11,500 followers just on its Spanish based Facebook page, the site doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.
Pinspire is not the first to imitate the popular scroll and pin format that so many love about Pinterest. Another site based out of Germany called “LikedBy” already has 1,45o Facebook followers and growing.
With the popularity and value of Pinterest, (recently valued at over $200 million) constantly growing, it’s no surprise several sites have popped up trying to achieve even a small slice of the creative pie. The question is, how far is too far when it comes to a blatantly obvious knock-off?
So what do you think? Will you be trying out Pinspire?
As for me, I noticed that a large majority of the pins originated from Pinterst. I don’t see a reason to follow another site just to pin the same things.
For some of you though, Pinspire might be ideal. If you’re getting tired of waiting for that invitation to Pinterest to finally go through, you will discover Pinspire only requires you to sign up. No more ridiculous waiting to be invited to a private club that everyone else and their dog already belongs to.
This post may contain affiliate links, which means I receive compensation if you make a purchase using the links.
It will definitely be interesting to see if Pinterest goes after them legally!
I won’t be using pinspire on principal. I hate stealing peoples ideas, when it’s so blatant. They didn’t improve it, or make it different, not even the color scheme.
Oops. I put the wrong principle down.
I’m hating Pinspire and I’m not even on it!! I click on the pin I’m interested in, click the link which takes me to Pinspire which is just linked to the main page so I have to scroll to find the actual pin I want, click on it, then on the link which takes me back to the Pinterest pin, then finally to the webpage it was pinned from. So annoying!
I would like to just try out Pinterest. But if you are right about getting in, I guess I have a long wait in front of me. ^_^
Trina, I requested an invite on Monday or Tuesday of this week and had my invite 3 days later. It wasn’t bad at all. But if you’d like an invite, I’ll send u one.
What a brutal copy of Pinterest. No I won’t be using it.
If you need an invite to pinterest, just let me know or ask anyone using it to send you an invite from their account.
The advertising comments are driving me nuts. Pinspire is nothing more than a cheap knock-off, and the commentors have clearly created their accounts only to advertise the new site (they don’t even pin anything). I wish Pinterest would make a Delete Comment option!
If you are waiting to get into Pinterest, find someone you already know that has an account and ask them to send you an invitation (it can be done right from the drop down menu under your name). That will get you in much quicker than trying on your own.
I think that Pinspire is a complete rip off and I’d be quite miffed if I were Pinterest. I’m not sure why Pinterest is doing the invitation thing but it’s not that hard to find someone who can send you an invite. If you’re in a super hurry you can pick one up at fiverr.com. It costs $5 but it’s quick.
If you have a friend on pinterest – which most people do – they can send you an invite and it’s there in about 2 mins. I’m hating the pinspire comments, really people. If its such a great site (I wouldn’t know), it shouldnt need to bombard the site it stole from to GET people.
I mostly wanted to make sure it wasn’t spam. Good to know. I don’t really care if they’re competitors. Look what happened when facebook came around and myspace went downhil… it was pretty much the same thing.
Wow, that is amazing. I too received one of those comments and checked it out quickly but had no idea it was such a blatant rip-off!
I will stick with Pinterest I think!
Best wishes,
Natasha.
I don’t understand who has to wait for Pinterest. How does someone not have a facebook friend they can ask to invite them?
[…] Cuidado no confundir con Pinspire! una red social creada en Alemania “sospechosamente” […]
Great stuff from youR http://www.familytechzone.com , man. Ive read your stuff before and youre just too awesome. I love what youve got here, love what youre saying and the way you say it. You make it entertaining and you still manage to keep it smart. I cant wait to read more from you. This is really a great blog.