"I Seek You" was founded by four Israelis who were tired of trying to find people on the World Wide Web. They developed an online paging and answering service, along with a pretty good private chat.
The founders, Yair Goldfinger, Arik Vardi, Sefi Vigiser and Amnon Amir, call their company Mirabilis.In just seven weeks of offering their product on the Internet, Mirabilis has signed up more than 65,000 users. It helps that registration is free.
"We got a chain reaction," Vigiser said. "The number doubles every week as more people join and send it to their friends. It surprised us that we got so many in so little time. But we're not surprised at the number of people. It's designed to be a global solution for millions of people."
The founders - all software developers - decided to create a communications net from the point of view of the user. Instead of going to a chat site and finding whoever is there, registered members start with people they know - who are also registered. Either party can invite others to join.
"It changed the way I search for people," Vigiser said. Random group chatting "is fun, but as an intimate communication channel, it makes no sense. To find the one I want to talk with, it's very inconvenient. This is the first system where you can see who's online and find who you want."
Upon free registration at the Mirabilis homepage (www.mirabilis.com) members download software and get a "universal identification number" that can be used to page them and pass on messages whenever they are online. The paging service is accessible from Mirabilis' Web site to anyone on the Internet. The online alert, messaging and chatting services can be conducted between members only.
As a member, you log in when you go online and people who have permission to put you on their own address list will be notified that you are live. They can request to join you in a chat; you can accept or decline.
Mirabilis has kept its development site in Israel, but moved its servers to New York, because, Vigiser says, the United States has the best network backbone - not to mention about 60 percent of the Internet users. The company also has an office in California's Silicon Valley.
The current software runs only on Windows 95. The company plans to offer an upgrade soon and versions for the Macintosh and for Windows 3.1.
The owners plan to continue to offer the basic services for free. They hope to unveil subscriber services for which they will charge, and corporate services and products with which they hope to become very profitable.
"We have a very big development plan," Visiger said. "We're working on a lot of ways we can look forward. And we're seeking investment. The growth has been incredible. This week, 4,000 new users each day. We're trying to keep up with the pace. It's too early to tell, but maybe we will go public."
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.)