Fabulis, a social network for gay men (“and their friends”) started by serial entrepreneur Jason Goldberg, is today launching fabulis 2.0, an upgraded version of its website and iPhone application. The fledgling company has also raised another $375,000 from undisclosed angel investors, bringing the total of capital injected into the startup to $1.25 million.
Fabulis calls version 2.0 a “major relaunch as a full-featured interactive social network”. Basically, that means it’s increasingly morphing into a well-designed mix-up of Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Groupon and Yammer, still specifically targeting gay guys.
Goldberg tells me Fabulis has attracted about 80,000 active members to date (the site launched about 5 months ago), with 5,000 new members signing up on a weekly basis.
With the launch of new site / iPhone app, these users will be able to update their status and view a stream of updates from other users (hence the Facebook and Twitter comparisons).
In addition, members are now able to “check-in” (hence the Foursquare comparison) and share their location with their friends or the community as a whole. Still available on the site are messaging and chat functionalities (hence the Yammer comparison) and a gay-relevant event directory.
Users can also “like” and comment on status updates from others, and sync their activities to their iPhone application. Members can now also easily link their Facebook Places profiles, effectively enabling them to pull in their Facebook check-ins and thus share their current locations with their Fabulis friends.
Also new in 2.0: Fabulis Auctions, which lets users bid on brand-name designer fashions and other stuff using the site’s very own virtual currency (Fabulis Bits) and Fabulis Exclusives, which are basically exclusive promotions and experiences available only to Fabulis members (hence the Groupon comparison).
Goldberg says users can expect the company to now launch new features weekly both on the web and on mobile devices to add to the current offering.
