

Garry's Posthaven - dmor
http://garry.posthaven.com/

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jmathai
I hate sounding like a broken record here but if you don't meet the following
criteria then stop saying you're going to preserve users' data forever.

* Have a full featured API right out of the gates

* Outline how users get their data out of your system

* Open source the code to ensure the ability for it to live on

Pledges are cheap.

~~~
jorde
Providing fully featured API out of the gates for a service which got launched
in a hurry (at least that's the impression I got) would probably be a bad idea
considering the early nature of the service. I'm confident that Garry will
provide one but API is something people shouldn't rush too much with. I'm a
firm believer of shipping fast but with APIs I tend to be cautious.

As for feedback to Garry: it would be nice if the line width would be shorter
or text being larger, I find it myself playing tennis a bit (fan of large
article type here)

~~~
jmathai
I just think when you make a pledge to users that you'll safeguard their data
_forever_ that you need to think through a few things that their team hasn't
yet.

Postponing the _forever_ message until the underlying features to support it
are built would go a long way.

Personally, I don't see the issue in launching with an API early. We launched
the API for OpenPhoto well before we had any UI.

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hooande
I wonder if the posthaven founders have decided to make this into an open
source like "foundation" (garrytan had mentioned interest in an earlier
comment [1])

I think a lot of people could get behind the idea of a permanent entity that
wasn't a for profit corporation. There is a strong case for building something
that endures, something that can be counted on to last for decades if not
centuries. Fiduciary responsibility means that corporations _must_ sell their
assets or shut down service if it's the most profitable thing to do. Not to
mention that companies can wind up selling all kinds of data and usage
information to whoever in a fire sale scenario.

The world needs more services with incentives aligned to long term investment
and global benefit as opposed to quarterly earnings numbers. Plus posthaven
founders are a rare type of people with a record of making cool things. They
have the ability to put together something that will be as useful in 2065 as
it is today.

A sort of "Posthaven Permanence Foundation" would be interesting. The key
insight is that it might be valuable/profitable immediately, or even in the
next 10 or 20 years. But if my back-of-the-envelopes are correct, posthaven
could run for a very long time on a relatively small amount of capital.
Organizations that are built around long term value have a way of winning in
the end.

[1] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5229862>

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bslatkin
I have some suggestions for Garry:

[http://www.onebigfluke.com/2013/02/blog-platforms-will-
not-l...](http://www.onebigfluke.com/2013/02/blog-platforms-will-not-last-
forever.html)

"To actually commit to the claim of being 'the most durable blog platform ever
created' and 'made to last forever', a blog hosting service should either:

A) Require new users to bring their existing domain.

    
    
        OR
    

B) Have users register for a new domain during sign-up. "

~~~
garry
If you've ever accidentally let a domain lapse, it's pretty clear using your
own domain is not necessarily more durable. Unless of course we figure out
some way to auto-renew the domain, which is a possibility.

~~~
benatkin
My domain is registered until 2021, and it only cost me as much as it would
cost for two years of PostHaven.

~~~
EwanToo
The significant problem with long-lived domain registrations is not the price,
but the potential that people tend to forget about the renewal date, move
email address and credit card number over that 10 year period, and lose the
domain when it comes to renewal time.

If you're talking "forever", or at least a lifetime, a 10 year cliff is a long
time but not that long.

You could do things, like actually turn off the domain service after 9.5
years, giving people a 6 month retention reminder of the blunt sort, but
there's not much clever that I can think of.

~~~
benatkin
Well, I'm going to extend it to 2022 by the end of this year. I'm not
advocating forgetting it for half a decade, but having a backup plan in case
you do.

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JacobAldridge
Does forever mean for as long as I'm paying my monthly fee? Or does cancelling
my account- eg, due to death - simply stop update - previous posts will still
be accessible to readers?

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lkrubner
App.net has evolved into a very good micro-blogging service, so why not use
App.net instead? You can upload photos and post long essays on App.net. And
App.net costs $3 a month, instead of $5 a month.

But I would not choose App.net simply because it is a little cheaper than
Posthaven. I would choose App.net because the guy who founded it, Dalton,
seems to have some kind of long term vision. There is a heavy focus on the API
as the future to a platform that goes beyond what Twitter is, and goes beyond
what Posterous was. That longer term vision is enticing, because it also
offers slightly more concrete possibility of longevity than the mere verbal
promise offered by Posthaven. After all, the only way any of these services
can offer longevity is by surviving, and the only way they can survive is to
have an idea that really is adapted to what the world needs next.

~~~
mikeleeorg
BTW, I'm looking at App.net right now and it says it's $5/month. Price
increase?

~~~
trafficlight
Or $36/year which works out to $3/month.

------
signed0
When this first came up I was trying to remember the last time I visited a
blog that is hosted on Posterus, then I discovered that Ycombinator's blog[1]
is still on Posterus, as is AirBnb's[2].

[1] <http://blog.ycombinator.com/>

[2] <http://blog.airbnb.com/>

~~~
garry
I'm going to move the YC blog shortly.

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damm
I'm sorry but their pledge does not say anything about what if they shut down?

If they are trying to improve on Posterous they need to be up front with the
fact that Posterous is closing and people don't want to move again in an year
year when Posthaven shuts down.

Businesses close, people die. If you are going to make a promise, make it
worth it.

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bambax
<plug shameless='no' shame='50%'>

I just built Urgeous, a (very beta) Posterous clone, and describe my
motivations here: [http://urgeous.com/p72t3aaa40h-mourning-posterous-how-and-
wh...](http://urgeous.com/p72t3aaa40h-mourning-posterous-how-and-why-i-built-
urgeous)

An API is coming (later today!) that will let you serve the posts from your
own server, while Urgeous deals with storage and the like.

The (current) plan is to stay free for things hosted on the Urgeous domain,
and to charge for the API (other suggestions welcome).

But since it's still very beta, the API will also be free when it opens.

Check it out! Send a message to post@urgeous.com (supports Markdown)

</plug>

~~~
bambax
... and here's the API: <http://urgeous.com/p83t3aaa410>

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arikrak
If you have your own domain, you can always export your blog to another
service, so what's the big deal? Also, if you want a reliable hosted service,
you can always use the free Wordpress.com or Blogger instead of some new
startup's offering. I don't think Wordpress or Blogger will be closing down
anytime soon.

~~~
garry
Note that we're not a startup. Our goals are to serve users and make software.
If it made no money at all, I would still work on it.

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ziadbc
It would be great if they can be successful at making a company where you can
be confident that your data will not die; but flexible enough for the
inevitable sampling of future 'bloggish' platforms that come out.

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manaskarekar
Question: How easy will it be to move the data out of the service at any given
point in the future?

~~~
aaronpk
Never as easy as copying files off of a web host.

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bambax
Curiously, the links on the top left (Funny Stuff, Photoblog...) still point
to Posterous...?

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edouard1234567
The pricing reads like it will cost $5/month forever. I suggest at least
adding inflation.

~~~
manaskarekar
From the pledge (<https://posthaven.com/ourpledge>)

>Will it be $5 a month forever?

>As long as we can! We'll do our best to keep it as reasonable as possible. If
costs go up, we'll have to raise prices. If they go down, we'll lower them.

>We believe fair's fair -- and we'll always be fair.

~~~
edouard1234567
I suggest they remove the "forever" next to the price to make it clear the
service will last forever, not the price.

$5.00 in 2006 had about the same buying power as $0.43 in 1930, so $5 in 1930
is equivalent to $58 today.

~~~
kylec
The cost of bandwidth and storage is dropping at a faster rate than inflation.
Besides, I'd say 90%+ of the blogs on a service like this would be mostly text
and low traffic, and $5/month can cover that today several times over.

That said, I'm not sure I'd trust another blogging service by the people that
created Posterous. They already had a chance to demonstrate that they would
keep the service running for the long haul and they didn't. I'd suggest people
take their $5/month and spend it on Wordpress.com.

