Scribd (pronounced /ˈskrɪbd/) is the world’s largest social reading and publishing company.

They make
it easy to share and discover entertaining, informative and original written content across the web and
mobile devices. Their vision is to liberate the written word, to connect people with the information and
ideas that matter most to them. Scribd was founded by Trip Adler in 2006. Scribd's major competitors
are Docstoc, WePapers, and issuu.History

The idea for Scribd was originally inspired when Trip Adler was at Harvard and had a conversation with
his father, John R. Adler about the difficulties of publishing academic papers. He teamed up with
cofounders Jared Friedman and Tikhon Bernstam and they attended Y Combinator in Cambridge in the
summer of 2006. Scribd was launched from a San Francisco apartment in March 2007 and quickly grew
in traffic. In 2008, it ranked as one of the top 20 social media sites according to Comscore. In June 2009,
Scribd launched Scribd Store, and shortly thereafter closed a deal with Simon & Schuster to sell ebooks
on Scribd. Over 150 professional publishers including Random House, Wiley, Workman, Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt, Pearson, Harvard University Press and Stanford University Press are now associated
with Scribd. ProQuest began publishing dissertations and theses on Scribd in December 2009.

In October 2009, Scribd launched its branded reader for media companies with The New York Times, Los
Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Huffington Post, TechCrunch and MediaBistro. Over 100 media
companies now use Scribd’s branded reader to embed source material into their stories. In August,
2010, news stories began to break and documents and books began to go viral on Scribd including the
overturned Prop 8 and HP’s lawsuit against Mark Hurd’s move to Oracle.

Adler is currently the CEO of Scribd, where he is responsible for the product and strategic direction of
the company. BusinessWeek named Adler one of the “Best Young Tech Entrepreneurs 2010”.

Awards/recognition

In September 2009, BusinessWeek named Scribd one the “World’s Most Intriguing Startups”. In
December 2009, Forbes named Scribd one of its “10 Hot Startups”. Fast Company Named Scribd “One of
its Top 10 Most Innovative Media Companies” in February 2010.

In May 2010, Scribd was recognized as one of the “2010 Hottest San Francisco Companies” by Lead411.

On September 1, 2010, the World Economic Forum announced the company as a Technology Pioneer
for 2011. After the World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer Award, Time Magazine named Scribd
one of the “10 Start-Ups that Will Change Your Life”.

Timeline

In February 2010, Scribd unveiled its first mobile plans for e-readers and smartphones. In April 2010
Scribd launched a new feature called "Readcast" which allows automatic sharing of documents on
Facebook and Twitter.[18] Also in April 2010, Scribd announced its integration of Facebook social plug-
ins at the f8 Developer Conference. Scribd rolled-out a re-design on September 13, 2010 to become
according to TechCrunch, “the social network for reading.”

Reception

Scribd has been received positively by several commentators. Scribd has been praised by several
newspapers and has been dubbed as the potential "YouTube for documents". Notable users of Scribd
include Virginia senator Mark Warner. Former California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, New
York Times DealBook reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin, All Things D Reporter Kara Swisher, the U.S. Federal
Communications Commission (FCC), Red Cross, UNICEF, World Economic Forum, The World Bank, Ford
Motor Company, HewlettPackard, and Samsung.

Scribd has currently more than 50 million users and it hosts more than tens of millions of documents.
Scribd's documents are embedded more than 10 million times across the web and more than 1.8 million
searches are conducted on Scribd's website everyday.

Scribd has struck deals with several major book publishers to publish content online. These include
Random House, Simon & Schuster, Workman Publishing Company, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Thomas
Nelson, and Manning Publications.