FAQ

Sure, we had to wrap up our journey as a startup. But that doesn't mean people stop asking questions about what we built and who we are. For the curious cats among you... Here are some answers!

What is Gated?

Gated is a company founded in 2021 to help busy professionals take back control over their attention. The company built two products. Its original email solution helped keep unwanted email out of inboxes by sending a "challenge email" that asked unknown senders to donate to a user's preferred charity in order to reach them. The second product, released by Gated in 2023, extended this vision beyond email with profile pages that could be used anywhere. Although loved by many and responsible for driving change in seller behaviors, Gated closed as a company in September 2023.

What do I do, now that Gated is closing down?

If you use our email solution: On September 30th, Gated will stop filtering your emails and no more challenge emails will be sent. Otherwise, your inbox will be unaffected. You can keep/archive/delete any of the emails in your Gated folder easily. If you want to keep your Allow List data, we'll be making it easy to do that – see instructions sent to the email address on your account.

Until September 30th, 2023, you can still access your email account by going to this Login link.

If you use our profile pages: We recommend removing your Gated profile link from any public-facing channels as soon as you are able, so that you will stop receiving messages there. Read/respond/archive any messages you have received, prior to September 30th, when profile pages will no longer be active. Until September 30th, 2023, you can still access your profile page via the Gated app.

Questions? Email support@gated.com

How will my data be handled?

User privacy and control was at the core of Gated. Your data is your. We won’t sell it. Over the 30 days prior to October 1, 2023, Gated users will be able to download their Allow List data; please check the email associated with your Gated account for specific details.

What alternatives are there to Gated's email product?

Gated's email solution was truly unique. Although no companies charge senders or benefit charitable organizations, there are a number of companies that help reduce inbox noise - such asSuperhuman or SaneBox. Additionally, since Gated is open-sourcing our code... we already know of at least one other company that is building a successor to Gated. 👀

Gated users: Please look in your email to receive special discount codes for certain companies.

What alternatives are there to Gated's profile pages?

Again, Gated's solution was 100% unique in that it gave users the ability to look at messages only related to the topics they care about. However, there are plenty of other single-page landing pages that professionals have used to proactively communicate what they care most about - check out LinkTree or Carrd as different examples.

How do I get the open source code for Gated's email product?

We will be posting the code on GitHub during the month of September, 2023. When available, you will find a link to it here.

Who was the team behind Gated?

Gated's Founder and CEO, as well as the creator of Gated's MVP email product, is Andy Mowat. CofounderMelissa Moody was the first other employee and served as CMO. Allen Hartwig was CTO, running both product and engineering. Over the course of the company, there were as many as 10 "Gators" but the company ran a tight ship, supported by a large group of Advisors.

What charitable impact did Gated make?

Gated created more than $500K in value for charitable organizations - in donations and ad impression value. Every user was able to select their preferred charity and the top 5 charities, in terms of donation amount, were: Doctors without Borders, charity: water, SPCA, Alzheimer's Association, and World Central Kitchen.

What other companies protect my attention and focus?

Every company says they'll save you time. But only a few companies are purpose-built or have a mission related to protecting your valuable attention. The Gated team would like to give a shout-out to: Clockwise (time-blocking), Caveday (focus sessions), Brain.fm (tunes), Brave (ad blocking).

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