

Zapier (YC S12) Raises $1.2M Seed Round - WadeF
http://techcrunch.com/2012/10/31/zapier-raises-1-2m-seed-round/

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bryanh
This article ended up pretty light on details, but a lot more information
about us here: [https://zapier.com/blog/2012/10/31/zapier-100-connected-
serv...](https://zapier.com/blog/2012/10/31/zapier-100-connected-services-
year-review/) via <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4723588>

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wamatt
Fantastic story, and I was initially excited for, and promoting Zapier. But
then a simple request for single folder Dropbox access, seemed to fall on deaf
ears.

I don't have a personal agenda other than good citizenship and concern for
best practices that affect the community.

 _If you're dumping a file to my Dropbox, why do you need full read access to
all folders?_

 _If you adding a note to Evernote, why do you need full r/w access to my
entire note store?_

 _etc_ _etc_

The simple answer is often it's not needed. For example, Wappwolf gets it
right in this case (<http://i.imgur.com/Ug5Fi.png>), by allowing the freedom
to choose.

Sure it's simply easier and less hassle for a startup to deal with things like
users privacy concerns.

However, if anything, it's an opportunity for you guys to be leading and
setting the example in restricted, 'only what you require', SaaS security
model.

This idea of giving exponentially more startups, _complete access_ to your
increasingly critical online services, does not seem wise at all.

Apologies for a bit of a rant, just rather passionate about this issue, and
hope you guys will take it seriously :)

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bryanh
More nuanced scope settings are definitely something we'd like to do. Put
simply, we just haven't had a chance to get to it quite yet, but we're
definitely hearing more requests for it and we want to honor those requests.
We're working on it!

~~~
wamatt
Good stuff :)

Actually wasn't concerned with timelines, but rather a principle statement of
agreement or disagreement. Of course there are pragmatic issues, but also its
very easy for startups in public diplomatic relations to say "yup sure" and
have little interest in following through. (not saying that is necessarily the
case here of course)

Hence why I was raising the question at the principle level, rather than a
specific feature level to be slotted in with all the other todo's.

Like I said before.. I have personally nothing to gain from this
implementation. But if it takes more users to request it then so be it for you
to notice then so be it. I will continue to raise awareness of the greater
issue here. (Beyond Zapier as well)

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andrewljohnson
Zapier is great, I use them to integrate DropBox with HipChat, and it was no
trouble at all to set up. And that's what I'm looking for in a product, solves
a problem, no trouble to set up. One of the founders was also happy to chat
with me about the DropBox integration, which is nice - sign of good customer
service to come.

I also integrate GitHub with HipChat, but don't need Zapier for that. Anyone
else do any integrations with HipChat they find useful?

~~~
bryanh
Hey Andrew, we have a few things we do with HipChat (or Highrise or whatever),
I'll list my favorites from usefulness to "just for fun":

    
    
        * churns in Stripe trigger a message in the chat room, we always try to
          follow up immediately and figure out why
        * specific support requests or emails also trigger in the chat room
        * Google alert RSS feeds for Zapier also dump mentions of Zapier across
          the web into the chat room
        * we have another chat account called the ZapBot. he's a bit foul mouthed,
          but anyone can control him through a Gtalk->HipChat zap we set up.

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mikeknoop
Here is another article from a Silicon Prairie News which also has more
details: [http://www.siliconprairienews.com/2012/10/zapier-
raises-1-2m...](http://www.siliconprairienews.com/2012/10/zapier-
raises-1-2m-seed-round-hires-first-employee)

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knowtheory
Congrats guys!

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ianstormtaylor
Nicely done guys! Once you made that spinner, the rest was inevitable :p

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mikeknoop
Someone noticed the spinner! Every time someone manually clicks "spin", we log
it (we do not log the automated first spin):

<http://i.imgur.com/LCFu6.png>

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thejosh
It's a great gimmick that shows endless possibilities for your service.

Great idea and execution, and actually a startup I like.

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timjahn
So happy for these guys! Wade and his team are a great bunch who have a
passion for helping business owners streamline their processes. Excited to see
them continue to grow.

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ddt
I use Zapier to send me text message digests of certain kinds of tweets. For
something so easy to use, it's incredibly powerful.

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ashrust
Nice job guys, this is going to be a big industry.

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juddlyon
Well done. I'd love to give this a whirl on a client project, great idea.

Please post some technical details on how on earth you connected all this
stuff (in general terms without divulging any secret sauce).

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edwardog
Woo woo! I love to see Shopify Apps like these grow up :D

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caseorganic
Well deserved, and way overdue!

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zacharycohn
Glad to see a Startup Weekend company ROCKING it. :)

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littlegiantcap
Way to hustle! Keep on building.

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binxbolling
Nice work!

Any chance Zoho Creator is coming soon?

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philipcamilleri
Good job guys!

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carrja99
Good job guys!

