

Ask HN: Help me find a niche for my file sharing site - mcrittenden

I launched Fileslap (http://fileslap.com) a couple months ago. The basic idea is that it's a better way to share small files (images, word docs, PPTs, songs, etc.) than emailing them which is what most everyone is currently doing, because Fileslap displays the file on the web without making the user download it.<p>The response has been lukewarm (lots of free users but only a couple paid users), so I recently started thinking maybe I'd see more success by targeting a specific niche.<p>One example that I thought of is targeting teachers who want to share assignments/docs with their students and maybe get assignments turned in through a website, rather than emailing back and forth with all of the students (like lots of college professors do).<p>Like I said, that's just an example (I'm sure there are already sites like that for teachers), and I'm wondering if anyone has any other ideas for niches that could benefit from an online file sharing/viewing site like Fileslap?
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paulf
Congrats one two milestones: launching and having paid users. I think I first
saw FileSlap on reddit - well done.

I like the simplicity of the audio player. I can't pinpoint a niche off the
top of my head, but I can see the appeal of sending a quick link, "Hey, listen
to this". I know a few musicians who might be interested in using FileSlap for
that purpose.

While I'm here, may I offer a suggestion for your website? I would keep that
slider for view demo/see examples visible by default. I just read that I can
view files without downloading them...my next question is how, say, PDFs are
going to look on your site. I actually missed your "see some examples" link
the first time I scanned the page. (You could then remove the "View demo"
button and have a bigger call to action, but I'll leave the details to you)

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mcrittenden
Thanks! Interesting feedback on the music uses. I'll post in a couple music
subreddits and see what they think about it.

Great suggestion. I've been toying with the idea of leaving that open by
default and switching the "Demos" button out with a "Try Now" button, so that
people can actually upload a file before registering (and just have it expire
after 5 minutes or something). I'll go ahead and get started on that.

Thanks again!

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mdgrech23
So for image sharing you have Flickr, and for music/videos you have Youtube
for sharing.Both are these services are well done, have big money backers, and
are household names. That leaves document sharing opening, sure there is
Scribd & Google Docs but I would argue neither are house hold names.

You could also change up your game plan to offer something like Posterous. It
seems like you've already created a service that easily allows users to get
content up on the web. Maybe it's just a matter of giving them additional
tools to share that content?

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jolan
Rather than going for a niche, how about a wider audience? The majority of
file sharing sites allow anonymous uploads and yours does not.

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mcrittenden
I originally allowed anonymous uploads (back when it was just a hobby site
that I wasn't trying to make money off of) and took it away for a couple
reasons:

\- It was losing me tons of money because uploads were coming in like crazy
and I wasn't making any money off of the site.

\- I had no way to keep track of who's uploading what and interact with or
analyze my customers and their usage.

I'm considering adding anonymous uploads that expire after a short amount of
time (like 5 minutes or so) just as a way to let people try out the service
before signing up. Do you see that as a good alternative? Or is even that not
enough?

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jolan
> losing me tons of money

There are a lot hosts that charge for throughput and not actual bandwidth,
i.e. <https://www.gandi.net/hosting/>

> I had no way to keep track

Cookies?

If you like reddit, advertise it there as "like imgur but for all file types"

