Summary in your words BASED ON areticle relating to  VENTURE CAPITAL Imgur: From Reddit ‘Gift’ to $40 Million in Venture Capital In February 2009, college student Alan Schaaf built a photo-uploading tool for the users of Reddit, an online discussion board that needed a way to share viral images. What Mr. Schaaf says was simply intended as a gift — an “image-sharing tool that didn’t suck,” as he put it — in five years has become a photo-hosting juggernaut and now the newest prized investment of venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. Imgur (pronounced like “imager”) said Thursday it raised $40 million from Andreessen Horowitz and a small investment from Reddit, the forum that contributed to Imgur’s rapid ascent. The funding is Imgur’s first other than a $25,000 grant in 2010 from a program at Ohio University, Mr. Schaaf’s alma mater. After Mr. Schaaf created Imgur as a junior in college, Reddit users took to the site right away in part because it allowed easy, anonymous image uploads. The images – not just photos but memes, Photoshop creations, and GIFs – inspired comments and sharing on Imgur itself, and traffic followed. Today Imgur has more than 130 million unique visitors who rack up 40 billion image views a month. After users upload an image – of their pet, crazy craft project, or a favorite celebrity captured in a meme – the image is often shared on Reddit, where it picks up speed before being shared out to Facebook, Twitter, and the wider world. In some sense, Imgur has become the Ellis Island of viral images: Before images become famous, they enter the free world here. “Here” is a small office on the fourth floor of a building in the decidedly gritty mid-Market Street neighborhood of San Francisco, and the office space reflects what has been a lovable trait of Imgur: Independence. It has been a completely self-funded company with no investors and a fiercely loyal and outspoken user base. In 2011, TechCrunch named it “Best Bootstrapped Startup.” For the past several years it has fought off would-be buyers. The company began accepting sponsored images in 2012, allowing businesses to buy ad space on its home page and nestle an image among those voted up and down by users. The site has waded gradually into advertising with campaigns by Internet-friendly brands like Will Ferrell’s “Anchorman” movies. The company recently added a metrics dashboard for users to track their images’ popularity, showing how many times their images are being viewed, and on which platforms. Soon the company plans to expand its image search to allow users to find various types of content. Sixty percent of Imgur users are in the U.S. today, with the rest spread across the English-language speaking markets of Canada, Australia and the U.K. International expansion is not an immediate focus, but there’s “huge potential to get into new markets,” given the viral and visual nature of the content on Imgur, Mr. Schaaf said. Investment in the unpredictable and democrat.

1. Summary in your words BASED ON areticle relating to
VENTURE CAPITAL
Imgur: From Reddit ‘Gift’ to $40 Million in Venture Capital
In February 2009, college student Alan Schaaf built a photo-
uploading tool for the users of Reddit, an online discussion
board that needed a way to share viral images.
What Mr. Schaaf says was simply intended as a gift — an
“image-sharing tool that didn’t suck,” as he put it — in five
years has become a photo-hosting juggernaut and now the
newest prized investment of venture-capital firm Andreessen
Horowitz.
Imgur (pronounced like “imager”) said Thursday it raised $40
million from Andreessen Horowitz and a small investment from
Reddit, the forum that contributed to Imgur’s rapid ascent. The
funding is Imgur’s first other than a $25,000 grant in 2010 from
a program at Ohio University, Mr. Schaaf’s alma mater.
After Mr. Schaaf created Imgur as a junior in college, Reddit
users took to the site right away in part because it allowed easy,
anonymous image uploads. The images – not just photos but
memes, Photoshop creations, and GIFs – inspired comments and
sharing on Imgur itself, and traffic followed. Today Imgur has
more than 130 million unique visitors who rack up 40 billion
image views a month.
After users upload an image – of their pet, crazy craft project,
or a favorite celebrity captured in a meme – the image is often
shared on Reddit, where it picks up speed before being shared
out to Facebook, Twitter, and the wider world. In some sense,
Imgur has become the Ellis Island of viral images: Before
images become famous, they enter the free world here.
“Here” is a small office on the fourth floor of a building in the
decidedly gritty mid-Market Street neighborhood of San
Francisco, and the office space reflects what has been a lovable
trait of Imgur: Independence. It has been a completely self-

2. funded company with no investors and a fiercely loyal and
outspoken user base. In 2011, TechCrunch named it “Best
Bootstrapped Startup.” For the past several years it has fought
off would-be buyers.
The company began accepting sponsored images in 2012,
allowing businesses to buy ad space on its home page and nestle
an image among those voted up and down by users. The site has
waded gradually into advertising with campaigns by Internet-
friendly brands like Will Ferrell’s “Anchorman” movies.
The company recently added a metrics dashboard for users to
track their images’ popularity, showing how many times their
images are being viewed, and on which platforms. Soon the
company plans to expand its image search to allow users to find
various types of content.
Sixty percent of Imgur users are in the U.S. today, with the rest
spread across the English-language speaking markets of Canada,
Australia and the U.K. International expansion is not an
immediate focus, but there’s “huge potential to get into new
markets,” given the viral and visual nature of the content on
Imgur, Mr. Schaaf said.
Investment in the unpredictable and democratic arena of viral
images prompts an interesting question: Can businesses
capitalize on the spontaneity and power of memes? Imgur’s
platform and functions bring new organization to the once-
voodoo world of viral image-sharing, which has been uncharted
territory for businesses. And will the Imgur and Reddit
communities – outspoken and authentic as any on the Web –
accept the company’s new investor, or condemn it for “selling
out”?
“We absolutely worried about ruining the party,” said
Andreessen general partner Lars Dalgaard of the possibility of
disrupting Imgur’s community. “But we are in love with what
they are doing. This is about giving them the time and space to
expand their vision.” Mr. Dalgaard said monetization “is not the
discussion right now.”

3. “Being bootstrapped made us that much cooler, but now we
want to truly become a household name. It did become
inevitable” with the company’s growth, said Mr. Schaaf. “We
will have to find a much bigger office.” He plans to double or
even triple his staff of 13 by the end of the year, which will
require considerably more room than the company’s birthplace
of student housing.