
Build It With Me (Connects designers and developers) - tortilla
http://www.builditwith.me/
======
tdavis
Two biggest problems with this:

1\. The interface is awful and terribly slow. I don't feel like you can have
filtering as a "coming soon" feature when the entire service is based around
filtering. Also, I don't know what sort of awful JS is used to power the site
but it really needs to go. It feels extremely sluggish (which after browsing
Drew's other sites seems to be a theme).

2\. It's built entirely on trust and very limited amounts of information. I
feel like one could waste a lot of time contacting and vetting prospective
collaborators.

I really want to like services like this; finding fellow designers/developers
is difficult whether you have a project in mind or not and is really stodgy
outside the comfort of referrals. Sadly, this isn't looking like a great fix
to the problem (though it is a start).

~~~
dannytatom
Relevant to this, I got this upon loading the site.

    
    
        A script on this page may be busy, or it may have stopped responding. You can stop the script now, open the script in the debugger, or let the script continue.
    
        Script: http://www.builditwith.me/js/jquery.js:19
    

While sexy, it is extremely sluggish here as well. :/

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wvenable
I like the concept. I'm a developer (web / desktop / mobile / whatever) with
minor design skills. If I was to ever do any sort of project on my own, I'd
need and want to partner up with a designer. Hell, I actually need an idea
too!

But the interface of this site is feels wrong to me. It seems to be assuming
that I want to make a really quick (5 minute) decision based on very little
information. But choosing to partner with someone is a rather significant
event requiring time and research.

~~~
gcheong
What I find interesting is that people often seem to feel this way, myself
included, but then there are these start-up weekend events where the goal is
to build something quickly based on ideas presented in one evening and teams
built in a couple hours and people seem to be willing to take that chance
without much problem. I wonder what the difference is that people perceive
that makes them so cautious in one context but not the other.

~~~
wvenable
If you waste a weekend on something (fun), that's not really a significant
loss. I'd be more than willing to waste a weekend building something even it
doesn't work out. However, most of my partnerships are have lasted much much
longer than that. It's very costly work on something for even a few weeks and
have the partnership fall apart.

Just recently a friend of mine had a serious break-down with his designer.
This wasn't a partnership relationship, he was contracting the designer. But
when the designer flaked out, misappropriated other designs, and disappeared
for weeks that ended up costing my friend a lot of time and money.

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natch
It wasn't snappy, but it was fast enough. The speed non-issue is definitely
not the first thing I'd fix.

On sites that you use ten times a day, every day, definitely speed is very
important. On something like this that might be used a couple times a year,
no.

The real issue is you need to get more useful information onto the front page.
The "number of ideas" column is next to useless. What does it mean that a
designer has zero ideas? That their head is completely empty? I doubt it. It
probably means they aren't necessarily looking to work on a specific project
they have in mind. But then, on the other hand, maybe there are some designers
who chose '0' because they really, truly, have absolutely no ideas (and, by
implication, no creativity). I would want to avoid those. How do I know which
are which? I don't. And if the number of ideas listed is 1, 2, or more,
similar opportunities for confusion abound. So that column is useless.

I was excited when I saw this, because it's hinting that it may be a good
tool... but please bring more detail to the surface. You may need to gather
that detail from the users, then present it, I don't know, maybe as CSS
display-on-hover windows next to each name, which is debatable as a UI, but
better than having to click through.

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alain94040
Actually, unlike other commenters, I found the interface to be pretty fast
(I'm on Safari 4.0.4).

I like it. Very cute. We could use some of those fancy GUI tricks on
FairSoftware.net, since it's basically the same people finder (with solid
legal dealing on top).

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natch
One interesting thing about this UI is it rules out finding people who are
already busy with projects, but who may be looking for people to join their
project.

So say I'm a developer with a good ('good' === 'pays the bills') project, and
need a designer, and I am not available, because I'm busy with that good
project.

Now I can search for a designer, but a designer cannot find me. Maybe this is
intentional; I'm sure some people would prefer it this way. Or maybe it's an
oversight in the UI design. It seems like the latter.

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vaksel
you are presenting way too much useless information on the homepage.

The list is useless from user perspective. It's just a list of names and
photos. Doesn't tell you anything about the person's experience without
clicking the "view description" link

I think a much better approach would be to let users create a custom subject,
to describe their idea. You can still display name + photo in user
description, but there is no reason for them to be in results.

~~~
alain94040
_a much better approach would be to let users create a custom subject, to
describe their idea_

Have you ever looked at <http://fairsoftware.net/publicProjects> ?

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terryjsmith
IE8 destroys the design: <http://i.imgur.com/qNEW1.jpg>

It looks fine in FF, but as a general rule I won't bother using a site that is
untested or doesn't support IE (especially without good reason). You're
eliminating 70%+ of your potential market in one fell swoop.

~~~
pavs
I rather not work with a developer or designer who might want to go out of
their way to support a browser that is horrible broken, at the expense of
his/her creativity. Regardless of how many people who uses that browser.

Remember, the prospective audience for this site are developers/designers who
are fairly tech savvy (or should be). Someone who is using IE8 (out of choice)
shouldn't be there.

To be on topic. The site looks nice and the interface looks awesome, but not
for a website. Maybe for a desktop application (specifically mac). It takes
too long to load.

I would suggest a more traditional design front ala linkedin (minus everything
that is wrong with linkedin).

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dylanz
+1 for filter by location. I like this. It's very straight-forward, no fluff.

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cmars232
How about a list of all the app ideas on there? It'd be fun to scrape and
crunch that data if this takes off.

Ideas have little value, but it'd be interesting to profile them.

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natch
There are other people besides designers that developers need to work with.
Writers and marketers are two that come to mind. But designers are a good
place to start.

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mattking
I have this idea, just need someone else to to do all the work for 10% share,
really it should be easy so if you can't do it in a few hours I'll find
someone else.

~~~
pavs
I have 10+ years of experience with google go and Windows 7, I would be
interested in working with you.

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jonathanmarcus
There are a lot of good application/web service ideas floating around freely,
which gives the site substance and a makes it really interesting. Great work!

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milkshakes
help me with mine? <http://www.builditwith.me/idea/1VBc>

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ct
Fast for me (Chrome) but yes the font sort of suxs.

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themullet
have to sign in to see app ideas, contact is via mailo, sort by app ideas?

