
 diary.io - should we build this? - adsahay
http://shouldwebuild.diary.io/
======
RyanZAG
You should build this if you want to build it. It's something you can point to
and say "Look, I built something awesome!".

But, chances are this will not be able to make money as it (1) requires user
setup (2) will be fairly difficult to build - api integration is not that easy
(3) most users simply don't care about what happens to their data until it is
gone.

(3, my experience) goes directly against your Thesis #2. (1) goes against your
Thesis #3 - users generally are not forward thinking enough to do something
now that will only benefit them later. I'd say start on actually trying to
test your Thesis #1-#3 before assuming them correct.

~~~
drharris
I think this identifies the issues I was feeling with the product, primarily
the point that users are rarely forward-thinking. Instead, they use the single
service that is hot right now, and don't look for alternatives until their
current one starts to die. The thought that they'd have to set up multiple
services (some of which might require a subscription and others that require
new accounts) will probably scare many off.

That said, I think an MVP is the way to go on something like this (NOT
something fake with a fake button; that's for scammy money-grubbers). There is
probably a niche for something like this; the only question is if they will
pay for it or not, and pay enough to keep the service alive. I know of
photographers that would love a one-click upload to all the photo sites. Same
with videos, tweets, and blog posts. Seeing if they will pay will simply
require you to try it.

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ed209
1\. There are already services to "backup" your socially posted content
<http://jolicloud.com> <http://socialfolders.me/>

2\. Cross posting to multiple services is really, really hard. Each service
has a different number of fields. You would have to get the user to complete
the full information for each service in one go. Technically you could map all
these fields, but from a UX point of view it's really hard.

3\. Most services cross post between other services already. At least in a way
that matters to most. And there are various ways that are "good enough"

Having said that, yes there is a demand for this. I've heard it direct from my
customers. I actually work the other way in that I aggregate what you already
post socially.

But I would look very hard at the financial side on this, I'm not sure you'll
make enough money to warrant the effort.

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raganwald
You're asking the wrong people.

1\. Read "The Lean Startup."

2\. Find the cheapest and fastest way to test whether potential customers
think you should build it for them. For example, you could make a fake product
web page with a "try free" button and count the number of people who click the
button.

Asking us is not lean. Asking customers is not lean. Testing customers !=
asking them. Building it is too expensive a test to be lean.

Gotta run, can't put more words into this, sorry!

~~~
drharris
Just because Lean is the buzzword of 2012 doesn't mean it's the right way to
do it. This comment wouldn't have made sense two years ago, and probably won't
make sense two years from now. Seems a little wrong to say that because it's
not Lean, it's wrong. Let them find their own way, "wrong" or not.

~~~
RyanZAG
Agreed. I can get behind the concept of MVP, but 'lean always' just doesn't
have the evidence. Was Henry Ford 'lean'? IBM's big mainframe business...
'lean'? Were windmills 'lean'?

Nearly all big inventions are the opposite of lean - some people went and
built something that nobody had thought of using before and those inventions
took off. If you had just put up a survey asking people if they want a 'noisy,
horseless carriage' you would have gotten a resounding no.

A lack of clicks on a random signup page with just a blurb doesn't imply the
product will fail in the market. It could imply that users don't understand
the value or a number of other things.

However, a MVP failing pretty much does imply failure, so I'd personally say
throw out 'lean' and stick with MVP for anything 'pushing boundaries'.

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vividmind
Guys, I really love the "shouldwebuild" this concept! This is a great way to
validate an idea. Can I borrow it for my concept please? :)

~~~
mebymyself
Should we build a "Should We Build ..." service? A service for validating
business ideas?

~~~
fideloper
Here's a flavor of the same idea: <http://launchsky.com/> (I think posted on
HN not too long ago)

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mnicole
If you're going to ask visitors to answer questions, don't force them to read
over things they don't need to know before getting to the meat of it. Just say
"Here are some concepts for a _______ app/service, based on these screenshots,
would you actively use this tool? If no, what features would you need to use
it?"

That said, the response will be from so many different people with different
ideas of their ideal solution to this that it shouldn't used to determine the
worth. People will try something if it exists, and they'd rather waste their
time trying to use it than answering questions about what _it_ is.

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btipling
Nope, because:

(engineer * number of engineers) - (average monthly payment * number of
customers) < 0

An engineer's salary at a small startup is at the very least $50,000, let's
just round that down to $5,000 a month, so how long do you think it would take
you to reach $15,000 a month in recurring revenue at what are probably $5 a
month plans (this does not include any other costs such as office, servers
etc). That's about 3,000 users. And that's just to pay a very poor salary with
no other kind of expenses.

~~~
Mz
Not to disagree with your overall point, but $5k/month x 12 months =
$60,000/year, not $50,000/year.

(Perhaps you were rounding up rather than down?)

~~~
btipling
Yeah I completely messed that post up. :P

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bonzoesc
Nope, because you didn't believe in it enough to build it, instead choosing to
waste time posting on websites. Zuckerberg didn't ask if he should build
Facebook, the GitHub founders didn't ask if they should make GitHub, and Jason
Fried didn't ask if he should build 37signals.

~~~
ed209
You're saying it's better to invest months of time, thousands of dollars only
to find nobody wants it?

For every Facebook you quote me, I'll show you 10,000 others that didn't
succeed and instead wasted time and effort when they could have done some
customer research exactly like this.

~~~
bonzoesc
> You're saying it's better to invest months of time, thousands of dollars
> only to find nobody wants it?

Why would you invest that much? If your minimum viable product takes months
and thousands of dollars you're doing it wrong.

~~~
ed209
that's not true. Not every product requires the same amount of "minimal".

You can quite easily get the signal from users of your MVP that they are not
interested - when actually it's just that you have a crappy MVP.

Besides that, your original comment was not about building an MVP, it was
referring to a full product. That's what I was referring to with "months" and
"thousands"

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bdcravens
I hope if you build it, you charge. I really don't think the world needs
another remix of social for the average users. "Should" should be based on
your needs (if you want to work for free, let me outsource some of my work to
you), not whether or not the socialsphere needs it.

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Mz
I think if there is value here, it is not so much in the backups and
crossposting, both of which are available already. It would be in helping
people manage their various personas or public image. And that would take
something more than just tech tools.

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slovette
I would use it and I know a ton of other people who would too. Is it the next
industry dominating creation? No, but I believe any service built on the backs
of other services hardly ever are. The product path isn't unique enough and in
the end you always rely on another business for yours to do well. Blah... It
would be a ton of fun to build though and you’d make a lot of people very
happy to have it, which is really why we all do what we do. Official label
suggestion from me: Hobby Side Project. Build the cortex and open it up to the
community for tweaks.

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martinshen
I think the question is "why"? Is this a tool you hope to go mainstream? Why
this over IFTTT? Is this a big opportunity?

~~~
adsahay
We're bootstrappers and don't mind serving a niche if there's enough value to
be generated (and reaped).

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mfincham
"Further, the image file as well as its metadata would be backed up to your
own little piece on the cloud"

Doesn't seem like much of a backup to me... I'd hope at the very least that
even if there isn't a local storage option they would build it to support
other peoples "cloud storage" products.

~~~
adsahay
This is something we're debating. If suppose data was to sync with a folder on
your Dropbox, we can't guarantee its integrity should you decide to remove or
move it, whether accidentally or intentionally. This isn't unsolvable, but
definitely something to think about.

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kmfrk
Just a minor thing, but you should use smaller mockup images, because the
automatic down-scaling is incredibly poor and results in a really jaggy image.

`width: x%` is always going to lead to poor image-scaling, but it can be
mitigated somewhat.

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lewispb
There should be an option to tell you I would not use or pay for this service.

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akshxy
Diary.io Diary.io Diary.io

Good to see you man! Heard your pitch at Startup Weekend Delhi

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polyfractal
Mmmm, maybe for companies/marketers. I can see a tool being useful to
customize/personalize your marketing effort across the various networks.

I don't see consumers ever paying for this, however.

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d0m
I'm impressed you made it to the front page, congrats on that.

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hpagey
This is very difficult question to answer. Unless you actually build it in
some way and ask your target audience to use it you won't get any concrete
feedback.

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romain_dardour
You're trying to sell people an Idea, this is a survey.

Getting people to pay for stuff is not the same as asking them if they would.

People don't buy Ideas, they buy Value.

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betelnut
Yes, but (sorry to be immature) maybe register a different TLD so the product
name doesn't sound so much like diarrhea?

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ddewit
I can't figure out what it's for. So I guess no, or perhaps improve the
message.

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dia80
Warning: Prospective questions are bad for your (business) health.

~~~
pilgrim689
Care to expand a bit? I'm curious.

~~~
dia80
Well meaning people inadvertently lie to you.

"Sure, that looks great! I'd buy one"

So you go off and make it only to be greeted by tumble weed when it comes time
to sell. Cure: retrospective questioning.

What steps have you taken to solve this problem? How much have you spent?

They're not going to unintentionally mislead you with those questions.

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PuercoPop
Yes!

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shimsham
please, no.

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mazsa
yes

