

Softlaunch of buddhalists, not just another todo list app. - templaedhel
http://buddhalists.com/

======
michael_dorfman
I'm not thrilled about the name.

First, it seems pretty disrespectful to use religious imagery, etc., for a
commercial product, especially if you are not a practitioner of said religion.
This is doubly worrisome by the text that seems to suggest that "zen" (or,
rather, Zen) and "Buddhism" are interchangeable concepts. They're not.

Second, if you are a practitioner, you're undoubtedly aware of the large role
that lists play in Buddhism-- which means that it's a bit deceptive to have a
product named "Buddhalists" (or Buddalists-- see below) and not have the
product based on the traditional Buddhist conception of lists.

Third: you don't even get the spelling straight on your own headline. That's
scary.

~~~
chanux
I have to agree with you (I'm a Buddhist). Anyway, it doesn't make me feel any
worse than what I'd feel of jesuslist or something. The problem is, not many
happen to think like me. Some people get very much offended.

So the name won't go well with any serious app.

------
headsclouds
From a design point of view (I'm a designer), I think you went overboard. When
I am working I don't want anything getting in the way between me and the list
items.

In your analysis of your competitors, for Workflowy you said that it's
confusing to have many nested lists (I'm paraphrasing here), but the thing
is—I find WorkFlowy way more logical than your service. The nesting is a
visual guide for the user, letting them know where they are within the tree.

At first I couldn't figure our how to check items off, but then I noticed the
little tiny “x” to the right, dangerously close to the “>>”. Feel free to beef
that one up, and space these two out. Also, apparently I can't check off the
last item in the list? That's strange, but it might be a bug.

Lastly, I love the help overlay, nice!

------
litmus
hmm...back blaze charges 5 dollars a month to back up my computer with
unlimited storage. you're charging 10 dollars a month for unlimited nested
strings.

the computer says..........no.

silliness aside, maybe try a forum for busy execs. Might get better input &
target customers.

------
templaedhel
Proud to announce the (soft) launch of <http://buddhalists.com/>, my first
foray into paid SaaS web apps. Please read on before tossing this out as “yet
another todo list app”.

<http://buddhalists.com/> <http://buddhalists.com/demo/>
<http://buddhalists.com/signup/>

But first the story. I create web apps I would use, mainly so I can use them.
I find myself taking lists for all sorts of things, and wishing I could
digitize them somehow. <http://buddhalists.com/> is the solution for me. I
sampled every list app in the app store (a good $60 worth) and found that they
were

1\. mostly focused on todo lists

2\. either too simple (think one page list) or too complex (think color coded
tags with autosort built in)

3\. Always limited to either managing one list, or several flat lists. I was
hoping for recursion.

This is what <http://buddhalists.com/> brings to the table. Simple
unconstraining lists with nice design, no rules, and infinite recursion. For
more explanation, see the demo. For a more detailed breakdown as to why other
list taking solutions were non ideal, see <http://pastebin.com/QVynrfkC>.

As far as tech goes, mongodb with nodejs backend, spine.js powered javascript
heavy UI. Stripe for payments.

~~~
sajithw
Edit: Realized you discussed WorkFlowy in your analysis.

I find the name distasteful. Would you be comfortable releasing an app called
jesuslists? Same idea.

------
cowboyhero
I like the simplicity of this. Like headsclouds, I couldn't figure out at
first how to make "sub" items. Due to old habits, I kept trying to hit "tab"
to indent a new item.

Now for the hard part. In a previous career, I used to spend a lot of time
with marketers. They always used to talk about "share of wallet" and the
phrase stuck with me. In short: Unless someone is loose with their cash,
there's a limited amount of money they're going to want to spend on online
subscriptions (of any kind). Given that your app is actually _more_ expensive
than a month of Netflix or Amazon Prime, how do you justify the price?

Note: I'm _not_ saying you need to lower your price, just that you need to be
more explicit about the value proposition. Especially because stuff like
Tadalist and Workflowy are free or freemium offerings.

------
Maro
How do you want to compete with Evernote?

It's available as a web app, native apps for iOS, MacOS, Windows (all my
platforms, also Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry), and it works great on all
platforms. It syncs so I have native access everywhere. It supports some
minimal formatting, but doesn't get in the way. It works great for managing
multiple notes, kind of like an Inbox. Notes are private be default, but I can
share them with people or make them public.

Oh, and Evernote is free.

So, what problem are you solving for $10 that Evernote doesn't solve much
better for free?

Also, Evernote has $95M funding, so their velocity is probably 100x yours.

 _PS: This is a harsh comment, but the intention is constructive. If you don't
have good answers to these questions, then it's back to the drawing board!_

------
Robin_Message
Works quite nicely, I like it. One small suggestion -- if I push right inside
the text box, and I've just come from pushing left, then go back to that item.
For example, say I'm looking at the shopping list in your demo. I'm on "get
veggies". I want to add tomato, but I can't remember if I had a "get fruits"
category. So I push left, glance down, see that I don't and decide to put
tomato into veggies anyway. Then I push right and nothing happens. Instead,
where possible, right should move me back, so I can go left-right and be back
where I started. Bonus points for left-left-left-right-right-right working :)

------
c1sc0
This is in no way a criticism of the actual app, but has building a to-do list
become our day's "writing your own text editor"? Fascinating how a new one
seems to pop up every day.

~~~
wingerlang
I think it is because of the fact that lists usually are super individual and
must fit someones workflow.

I actually wrote my own the other day. I have tested a LOT of websites and
apps but everything seems too cluttered.

So I made my own with these points in mind: \- MINIMAL \- Minimal functions.
OR they should be invisible until needed. (arrows to the right on the site) +
(statistics icon with hover on right to the top) \- Multiple lists
(categories) on ONE page so that they does not disappear. \- Chrome extension
for adding things \- BONUS: Some kind of achievment system would be nice for
keeping you motivated. Points for completing and -points for failing to-dos.

Works for me, others might not like it.

<http://wingerlang.se/demo/> Links on bottom to category-view (wich is like
"archive" and not like the to-do list) things can be moved around by clicking
the arrow-link

------
skrebbel
I think 10$ for an obvious weekend hack is quite a lot.

~~~
patio11
_obvious weekend hack_

But people will pay $300 for a lawyer writing a letter which says, attached to
the letter, "This took forty eight minutes to write."

And this is why you should never, never take pricing advice on HN.

[Edit: My conclusion here was excessively strong. Working on a blog post now,
because I feel the need to vent a little about this. $10 is not a lot of
money. Customers do not pay for how much you appeared to have worked. Argh.]

~~~
skrebbel
The lawyer charges you once. Also, the lawyer charges you alone.

Also, lawyers are overpriced, but that's another story.

~~~
skrebbel
Genuinely wondering how my pointing out that monthly subscription fees aren't
one-time service fees deserves me downvotes?

------
arondeparon
Apart from having a name and style that tries to invoke 'zenlike' feelings,
what does the app actually do that makes it stand out? There are 1000+1 todo
apps, many of which focussing on the 'less is more' principle. I don't see how
this app is different, apart from charging a really soothing $10 per month....

------
zokiboy
Putting name and price aside I don't like deep nesting approach for lists. I
tend to have too many levels and it's cumbersome to click so many times. I
like to have an option to see all my tasks at same level and get nice overview
of everything I want to do.

------
neilbowers
(1) you've spelled the product name two different ways in the first 3 lines.

(2) why would I pay $10/month for this when checkvist does this and more for
$0/month?

(3) the help overlay is nice.

(4) interaction on lists not intuitive.

------
dadads
Nice app and all, but I don't see myself paying $10 for something I could
easily replicate in a day. Not trying to be mean or anything, but perhaps I'm
not the target market here.

------
va1en0k
seems like an excessively designed analog of <http://workflowy.com/>, which is
awesome and simple, and arguably more Zen

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anghyflawn
Would I be far off the mark if I thought this is something like org-mode
without the Emacs? (And yes, you should get the title right.)

------
madaerodog
My 2 cents : Google Tasks blows this out of the water.

------
nikcub
nice that you are using spine - it is a great little framework

