Luma

Luma targets the community and tech event market abandoned by Eventbrite’s relentless fee hikes. Hosting a free event costs nothing; paid ticketing charges a processing fee without the Eventbrite dark-pattern upsell stack. The product invests in attendee experience—clean emails, calendar sync, social graph for repeat attendees—rather than extracting from every interaction. VC-backed with $22M raised, so the stage 1 window could close; rated here on current behavior rather than structural guarantees.