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"This post is part of Mashable\u2019s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.\nName: CollegeOnly \nQuick Pitch: Remember when Facebook was only for college kids? CollegeOnly is a return to those simple, pastoral days \u2014 with a whole lot more tech.\nGenius Idea: Facebook started out as a place for college kids to meet, greet and stalk crushes. Now the 500 million-member network is a haven for everyone from marketers to Moms to middle schoolers. Drag, man. Enter CollegeOnly, a new social network from the mind of  Josh Weinstein, a New York-based entrepreneur who also created RandomDorm (Chatroulette for the college set) and GoodCrush (a university-centric dating site). \nWhile creating these school-oriented sites, Weinstein saw a need for more specialized social networks. \"We've learned a lot from these experiences and realized significant opportunities, in addition to serving as proof points for the unmet needs and desires of college students,\" he tells us. \"Facebook has changed \u2014 for the better \u2014 but its original use case is currently unserved, as college students are less likely to upload photos or post what they are up to with parents and potential employers looking on. As such, we realized that the opportunity to 'connect student bodies' wasn't just romantic, but social.\" \nLike the recently introduced gated social community, The Fridge, CollegeOnly is a much more protected space. We couldn't even sign on and try it out, because it's... well... college-only. \"Except for moderation and evaluating success of features, I'm not allowed on the site either,\" Weinstein says. \"One of our investors asked me yesterday how he can view the site, and I said he couldn't. He asked if I was kidding, I told him I wasn't.\" (Sidenote: Peter Thiel, one of Facebook's early investors, is among those dishing out the money.)\nDown to the nitty-gritty. If you have a university e-mail address, you can join the site, where everyone in a school is instantly connected \u2014 no friending required (you can block people, though). Currently there are three schools on the site \u2014 Princeton, Yale and Cornell \u2014 but it plans to expand. Users can create profiles where they can include info like what dorm they live in, activities they're into as well as their classes. They can also upload multiple profile pictures, as well as snaps from Facebook. Weinstein emphasizes that these pictures will only be visible to those on the site, keeping them away from the prying eyes of parents and school administrators. So, frat boys \u2014 go wild!\n\n\n\n\nPerhaps most interesting are CollegeOnly's posting abilities. Users can post general updates as well as updates in categories like \"Events,\" \"After Party\" and \"Missed Connections,\" and can do so anonymously. The option to go nameless could cause issues, but Weinstein says that the site will be monitored. \"[We'll be] crowd sourcing moderation through 'flags' plus student moderators that scan every anonymous post before it goes live and review every non-anonymous post,\" he says. \"We want to have an awesome, fun and thriving stream and social experience, but it's also important to make sure our users aren't having a negative experience as a result of another's post.\"\nRight now, the site appears to be pretty basic (from what we're told), but features like text chat, video chat (which Facebook still lacks) and geo-location will also be included. \"In our social stream, you can tag posts with locations. For Missed Connections it's completely intuitive (and was a required field on GoodCrush), so too with general posts and photo,\" Weinstein says. \"On CollegeOnly you can know which frat/sorority has the best parties, which class is the best or most boring, which restaurant is the most popular... and also do it in real time (as posts and/or pictures come from a party, if a professor did something crazy or is droning on, or if there's a special discount or gathering at a venue).\" Mobile is also in the works.\nWhile we wish we could have actually tried out CollegeOnly, the site sounds like a solid idea that fills an actual need. As more and more people join social networks, specialization becomes a thing of the past. It's nice to see a return to the days of the close-knit social network. What do you think of CollegeOnly? Does it have a shot at graduating at the top of the social media class?\nSponsored by Microsoft BizSpark\nBizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2010/08/27/college-only/>