I’m late to the dopplr party, but I’m liking the site a lot.
It’s got the most most wonderful example of a written interface and spartan design that works well, loads fast (I presume) over a saturated Airport wifi (or Blackberry browser), and like all good software, is built on an interesting philosophy.
I thought their business model would be as crude as serving up ads to ‘high net worth’ individuals (or contextual ‘you’re visiting new york, here’s a great resturant’ etc.) but it may be that they’re looking to serve connections in a more subtle way.
I’m not sure if the Dopplr 100, where they’re invititing employees of 100 companies to join is an attempt to capture employees who are likely to travel and network, or part of a grander scheme to create social networks of peripatetic employees on behalf of host companies.
Even if it’s just signing up people, it’s a great marketing move.