

Show HN: I taught myself PHP and built TweetPerView.com - jordanlyall
http://tweetperview.com/

======
dools
The fundamental problem here is that I don't know if I want to tweet about a
video before I watch it. A tweet is like an endorsement, especially when you
have the extreme burden of more than 10 twitter followers (as I have) - you
have a responsibility to your adoring public to ensure you fill your stream
with high quality, relevant content.

All jest aside, I think it's a great idea to have the ability to tweet
_during_ a video as a seamless experience.

You've chosen a great example with Mixergy. Andrew's interviews are LOOONG and
I'm frightfully busy. I love watching his videos but I rarely make it through
to the end. If I have a tab open with hootsuite in it I'll quite often hop
across and tweet that I just watched the video, if the video were _totally
awesome_ I'd open up a tab to get to hootsuite and tweet about it but if it's
nice and interesting but not bone shatteringly good, no-one but me and
Wistia's video hosting stats will know that I watched it.

If, however, the "Are you enjoying this video? Click to tweet about it right
now" came up _during_ the first half of a video, I'd be far more likely to
spread the word about what I'm watching more often. Obviously it would have to
be less obtrusive than it is now and it shouldn't interrupt the flow of the
video at all.

~~~
johnrob
Nobody complains about referring friends as a way to ascend pre-release invite
lists (i.e. <http://www.socialcam.com/>). How is this any different?

~~~
rocktronica
The artificial scarcity on beta apps is understood but unavoidable, if that's
the route the app makers are going.

Telling me to bother my friends before I can watch a video that I can get w/ a
quick Google search or view-source is another matter.

(That said, nice little script you made. Pretty clever!)

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citricsquid
This is a clever idea, it is however _very_ horrible for users. I would close
a page if this was requested of me, although you may have some luck with
people in the "social media" field.

If I was running this site I would have it create a prompt at the _end_ of the
video that says "oh hey if you enjoyed this why not share on Twitter?" but I
guess Youtube already supports that natively... sort of.

~~~
petervandijck
Not everything that asks something of users is bad for users. I think it's an
awesome idea.

~~~
citricsquid
It's not asking something of a user, it's forcing them. If this was optional
it would be asking. I think it would be great if it was optional and showed at
the end of the video, why would you tweet about a video you've not yet seen?

~~~
Legion
Forcing users to do something isn't always necessarily a bad thing. It depends
on the use case.

In general, no, I wouldn't want to tweet about a video before seeing it, but
that doesn't mean it doesn't have a use inside of something larger.

~~~
alttab
I can't ever see a use case where it is OK to force a user to syndicate your
content before viewing it. It trying to force virality -- and after a while
users will stop watching videos, negating the effect if not harming the
content in the long run. Think "Expert's Exchange"

------
dazzawazza
Nice, I'd personally like to see an option to allow users to dismiss the
dialog and not tweet but still see the video.

I can see some uses for forcing a tweet but also for not forcing it.

Well done for diving in and learning something new.

------
mikerhoads
This is the perfect intersection between pretty crafty and annoying as hell.

It might be stronger if you could play the first 5 minutes and then prompt for
the tweet to see the rest of the video.

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jordanlyall
Hi guys, thanks for the response and feedback so far.

A couple things:

* This puts the M in MVP. By rolling it live, I hope to prove (or disprove) the general concept.

* As I mentioned earlier, the next iteration will include an option for the video creator to add a 'dismiss' button to allow the viewer to bypass the tweet requirement and just play the video.

* The next thing I want to test is an 'in-stream' tweet requirement. Perhaps it shows 30-90 seconds of a video and then it prompts for a tweet.

* I'm working on other, less obtrusive social actions: FB like, follow, etc.

Thanks again for the feedback. Keep 'em coming. :)

~~~
treeface
What framework are you using for PHP?

~~~
jordanlyall
No framework. Just hacking it all together. I'm a product/business guy who
picked up PHP/MySQL and JSON to achieve a proof of concept. If there's a
developer out there that wants to contribute, I'd be happy to chat.

~~~
treeface
As you continue your plunge into PHP, consider a super lightweight framework
like CodeIgniter. Moving to a Model-View-Controller pattern early will turn
you into a good developer a lot quicker.

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jarin
I can understand some of the criticisms in this thread (and from a user
experience point of view they're pretty valid), but I think using TweetPerView
on your videos is more like saying "this video isn't free, but instead of
paying money to watch it, you're paying a tweet's worth of social capital to
watch it".

I mean, ignoring the fact that the video is on YouTube and all.

~~~
jordanlyall
Exactly, perhaps I need to work on getting that point across. Think of it as
an alternative to micropayments.

~~~
jordanlyall
Also, the idea is that if the video creator wants to make it exclusively
available as a TweetPerView, they should mark the video as 'private' so it
won't show on YouTube.com and make it available to be embedded.

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netaustin
I have to laugh, because although I don't think I'd do this, most of my
clients are pageview hungry media sites, and they would love this. I'd say
within a month one of them will ask me if it's feasible to implement.

This reminds me in some ways of SolveMedia (the CAPTCHA that forces users to
engage with advertisers). What if you forced someone to tweet a CAPTCHA (I'm
commenting on this hot new video, check it out!) and then used the Twitter API
to verify?

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shaggyfrog
If I were ever forced to tweet about a video before I watched it, I would
immediately close the tab and instead send a tweet about how idiotic the video
poster is for making me jump through such a ridiculous hoop.

I'm not even sure how you'd take into account someone not actually having a
Twitter account in the first place. I hear tell those people call themselves
"normal".

Edit: almost forgot... if this "service" ever took off, the first thing I'd do
is write a plugin to disable it.

~~~
sinaiman
And I might set up a separate Twitter called "ShittyVideos"

Haha just kidding, I think this is a cool idea/experiment, it'd be interesting
to see what user reactions would be. Initially I would try to have a "dismiss"
button just so you can see the ratio of users who tweeted vs. dismissed to see
what kind of "annoyance index" you may be looking at here. Edit: ...what kind
of "annoyance index" you may be looking at _by disabling the dismiss button in
the future_

Definitely an interesting concept.

~~~
shaggyfrog
I don't comprehend why anyone would want to experience with seeing just how
far they can annoy a user, on purpose. It's like poking some poor caged animal
with a sharp stick. Are you annoyed yet? No? How about now... are you annoyed
yet?

~~~
sinaiman
Sure, you could look at it like that, but this is what marketing is at it's
core, really. You run a campaign and you then judge whether it was effective
or not. And yeah, when some marketing effort isn't effective, it could be
because it was annoying.

But, the bottom line is that marketing a product or service is the process of
figuring out what works on real people and a really good way of figuring that
out is by actually trying it out with a real audience and recording the
results, like a real experiment. You can call it purposely annoying users, but
I don't see it that way, and for all we know some people might like the option
of tweeting about the video they're about to watch...

~~~
shaggyfrog
There's a CBC radio show called the Age of Persuasion that did an excellent
show called "Breaking the Contract" [1] on this topic. What is the role of
advertising? You are saying is essentially about being annoying; I say, _bad_
advertising is about being annoying, and good advertising gives something
back.

The idea of putting up some sort of "Tweet-wall" before I can watch a video
and forcing me to tell everyone I'm watching said video is a bit like coercing
a review from someone about material they have never seen. Never mind being
incredibly annoying, it's also basically asking the user to lie. You can't
have an opinion about something about which you know nothing.

And do the Twitter messages coming from this Tweet-wall really add value? To
anything or anyone? To the user having to type the message, it's like they're
being asked to generate spam for all their followers.

And does that forced Twitter spam actually benefit the video in the long run?
Or does it cast a shadowy pall over the video, the video owner, the person
forced to tweet, and ultimately, the technology itself?

I'm fascinated at how many in this thread see this as a good idea. I can't
even fathom how someone would come to that conclusion.

[1]
[http://www.cbc.ca/ageofpersuasion/episode/2009/02/14/season-...](http://www.cbc.ca/ageofpersuasion/episode/2009/02/14/season-3-episode-7-breaking-
the-contract/)

~~~
sinaiman
"I say, bad advertising is about being annoying, and good advertising gives
something back."

I totally agree with you here. All I was saying is that it would be
interesting to see if this idea would work, that's all. One way to figure that
out is by running the experiment and capturing the statistics

------
dudurocha
Wonderful that you did this all by your self. How long did it take? Other
thing, I personally didnt like the "obligation" to tweet to see de video, one
thing that would bem more interesting it is if you need to tweet to continue
to watch the video. That guarantees that you are enjoying, and you want to
share. Other thing, maybe some real time tweets would be very fun, like you
write something little(100 characters) and than you have an update in tweeter.

------
kenkam
The design is fantastic and I think you might be on to something here.
Although there's the obvious problem (as seen from the comments) of users not
being able to see what they endorse first, you will find ways to mitigate
this.

Perhaps you let users tweet in the next X minutes of viewing; if they don't
like it, they close the tab and there's no tweet.

In any case, good luck, and I look forward to seeing this work for you!

------
one-two
I ain't tweeting shit, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQtXHp5wXLE>

~~~
jordanlyall
I'm using that public video just as an example. As someone pointed out above,
at its current state it's pretty easy to find out the url and watch the video.
1) It's a convenience thing, many of us download music on iTunes even though
we can pirate the mp3s. 2) we can't assume the behavior of the average web
user based on our own behaviors.

------
randall
I'm glad you learned PHP, but frankly I don't see how this site actually adds
value.

If someone likes your video, a simple call-to-action (preroll?) or a page
element loading with a tweet box seems like it'd be more effective than an
ultimatum.

Good design though, seems like you're on the right track for creating
products. Good luck!

------
egypturnash
Oh, good, you _do_ allow the user to edit the tweet before sending it off.

------
naithemilkman
Nice job on the self learning part. Not sure about interrupting my video
viewing experience. Maybe have that option at the end of the video or pop up
subtly in the middle somewhere.

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AndrewWarner
Holy crap. This. Looks. Stunning.

We need to talk.

------
sgallant
Congrats on learning PHP and building something. But what about that HUGE
percentage of users that don't have twitter accounts?

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sambarvada
The Tweet should contain the "title" of the video rather than saying "this is
a great video"

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s00pcan
So you created something to annoy users. How is this good?

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mohsen
maybe you'd want to let people watch your video without having to tweet it.
just a suggestion.

~~~
jordanlyall
That's next on the list. It's been the #1 request so far: a "just show me the
video" link. Perhaps the publisher has an option of enabling in the setup
process.

~~~
brownie
Perhaps you can have videos play a preview on accessing the site - allow the
user to click the play button, have the video pause after ten seconds/5% of
time, then pop up asking for a tweet if they want to continue watching.

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zalew
it needs an [x] button in the corner

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rokhayakebe
Very nice idea, but you should let users tweet in the middle of the video or
at the end. If you force me to tweet before I won't watch it, but in the
middle I will be very likely to.

~~~
jarin
That's probably true for most people if it's just a video in the middle of a
blank page, but I would guess that you can pretty easily get people to tweet
to watch the video if you a) put up a compelling description of the video or
series and/or testimonials, or b) already have a dedicated following.

If Seth Godin or Ramit Sethi did this, I doubt they would have any trouble at
all getting thousands of tweets on each video.

