Hayibo bids farewell

South African satire site Hayibo announced in its weekly newsletter yesterday that it will close its doors on Friday due to lack of funds.

“If we had a buck for everyone in corporate SA who said 'I adore the site, I just don't want to associate my brand with it,' we could have retired,” the newsletter said.

Hayibo is the brain child of Tom Eaton, Anthony Pascoe and Steve Porter. It was introduced in January 2008 and provides political and social commentary under the tag line: 'Breaking news. Into little pieces'.

“We see ourselves as a bastion of independent free thought in SA. We want to make people laugh, make valid social and political commentary. South Africa deserves a site like Hayibo,” says Pascoe.

“But we are not zealots or missionaries. While there has been an outpouring of grief at the announcement of our closure, love is not enough to sustain us,” he adds.

“It's nice to know people love the site, but we all have day jobs too. If it's not growing, and it's causing us time away from our lives and families, it's best we invest our efforts elsewhere.”

He says the site is not making a huge loss or a huge profit - it's treading water. The user numbers have reached a plateau and while the merchandise available on the site does relatively well, it merely pays for itself.

“If we thought that the lack of commercial support and interest was because of the recession and would recover in six months' time, it would be a different story. But advertisers have the budget, and just don't want to spend with us,” says Pascoe.

According to World Wide Worx Strategy MD, Steven Ambrose, Hayibo's closure is an anecdote of a bigger South African problem to do with Internet connectivity. He says the site had a very difficult niche to monetise.

“Hayibo was truly local; the content was only funny in SA where Internet penetration is low.”

He cites 4% of the population as having access to broadband and 12% in total being connected to the Internet.

Hayibo is popular among those who have ready access to the Internet, he says, but these are mostly a niche audience of geeks and media people.

Pascoe argues that while Internet penetration in SA is not huge, there is still enough to sustain a site like Hayibo.

According to Pascoe, Hayibo averages 80 000 hits a day, with some stories - he gives the example of a recent piece on Jackie Selebi - reaching 10 000 hits in their first day up on the site.

“We've never been sued, people find us funny, we have a loyal following. I think it's outrageous that no one wants to back us.

“Advertisers have the money,” he explains. “Even though it mostly goes to the big four media companies in SA there are niche sites out there with support. But they're safer. We don't pull punches. People are scared to be associated with that.”

World Wide Worx MD Arthur Goldstuck says funding satire is difficult for this reason, whether online or offline. However, online businesses must realise that eyeballs do not mean revenue.

Ambrose explains that the challenge of the Internet is that people expect to receive content for free. “Being well known doesn't mean your business model is good. It's easy to start a witty, cuttingly satirical blog, but with no core revenue model it will fail.”

The trio came up with the site in 2007 and “decided to go ahead with it because they could, not because of a fancy business plan,” according to Pascoe.

He explains that their business model included three revenue streams: syndication (which would drive hits to the site), advertising, and online sales. Without advertising, the business is not sustainable.

Pascoe says that if they find an income that is sustainable and renewable, they will stay open.

“We've received more orders on our online store in the last 24 hours since announcing closure than in the past six months. If we could retain that amount of sales per month we'd be happy,” says Pascoe, stating this is a reflection of individual support.

Pascoe says Hayibo considered putting a donation button on the site, but that the team decided they were likely to witness the same as they had with the store - a huge outpouring of support in reaction to their closure, then nothing.

“We can't just keep announcing we will close,” he says.

Pascoe says the founders are busy meeting with parties who may be able to help, but he remains cautious. “We don't want to be like a high school couple who keeps breaking up and getting back together again.”

Both the site and the merchandise store are open for the time being, but both will close soon says Pascoe, as they cost money to keep running.