Today, I interviewed Alexander Kintis, founder of a new social networking site called Beating Addiction.
1. How did you first got into the internet?
A long time ago, I remember my mother had a computer that had a 14.4 baud modem and had access to Prodigy. I remember using it from time to time for various different things. A while after that, I remember using AOL – I believe it was around the time 2.0 was out.
2. What does your company do? And why did you shift your focus?
The company, Kinal Corp, was initially incorporated to provide professional web development services to various clients. The focus was shifted after I had a great idea of combining a social networking concept with an actual purpose. The idea of Beating Addiction was born and, fast forward in time, it can be found at www.BeatingAddiction.com
3. Tell us about your main project Beating Addiction. What is it all about?
Beating Addiction is a website where people can go to overcome an addiction to anything. Many people know and consider alcohol, gambling, and other commonly categorized addictions as “serious” however others like shopping, coffee, World of Warcraft, Facebook, cats, aren’t. I disagree. Anything can be addicting and there should be an outlet or center where people can go to and seek help and find information.
The site offers a complete social network – similar but not as in-depth and functional as Facebook or MySpace – where people can find more information on an addiction, find similar people who added that addiction to their profile, and speak to one another and get advice and information on what helped them beat or, at least, begin their road to recovery and curbing and stopping their addiction. They can become a supporter of one another – or colloquially known as “friends” –, they can join support groups, they can create journal entries, they can leave comments, etc. They can also find information on different facilities where they may go to seek professional help and care if they wish. Additionally, members can be as public or as private as they like.
4. What inspired to start this site?
In early 2005, I saw how powerful and loyal members were of social networks – such as a Facebook and Myspace – but there wasn’t any real purpose to it other than getting people together, networking, and being a “place for friends”. So I had the idea of a social network approach with a purpose and combined it with the addiction recovery idea and Beating Addiction was and is the end result.
5. What makes Beating Addiction different to other social networking sites?
It’s a lot more than just a social networking site and although it is 2009 now, when the site was initially released at the end of 2005 (and then left alone for about 2 years and then upgraded) the social network aspect of the site had an actual purpose to it unlike many of the other networks at the time.
6. Who is Beating Addiction for?
Anyone that is addicted to anything.
Anyone who has knowledge of any kind of addiction and they feel that they would like to contribute their knowledge and help others.
Facilities and professional individuals that wish to offer their professional services to members and visitors.
7. How do you plan on promoting it and getting the word out for people to start using it?
There are many different ways of which a few will require funding.
SEO. The site has information on all addictions and so anyone looking for information on those addictions and how to overcome them; for example, when searching a search engine, people will be linked to the addiction’s profile page.
Speaking to blog authors – such as yourself – about the website and having them do write-ups about it so their readership gets wind of the new site. Also to those that have a vision of how well the site and idea is and can become.
Adwords, celebrity endorsements, news coverage, press releases, and other routes.
8. What are your future plans for Beating Addiction?
That’s really tough to say because what I envision now may and will change with time due to various factors and variables.
9. Where do you envision Beating Addiction to be at in a couple of years?
I would say a big network/community of individuals that are contributing content and information and helping one another. Also facilities that are a part of the community and their services available for interested individuals. Again, it’s all really hard to say, wish, envision, and speculate because a couple of years is a lot of time.
Thank you very much Stanley for the interview questions. I hope to be able to speak to you again sometime soon and that you are successful on your journey of entrepreneurship. Your story of “making it” is a great one as well and I wish you continued success.
