

Cupcake - ninthfrank07
https://cupcake.io/

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calinet6
Yeah, I have to agree: whether or not you can explain it to me here, that page
does not explain to me what I'm buying, why I'd want to buy it, or what I can
use it for exactly.

Seems cool, but better marketing is required.

*edit: See: [https://tent.io/docs](https://tent.io/docs) \-- that breakdown is actually one of the better explanations of any protocol I've ever seen. Clear, succinct, concise. Really a thing of beauty. Cupcake needs to be explained in the same way. Shoot, I wish everything was explained that well.

~~~
danielsiders
Thanks for checking it out. As you discovered Cupcake is a hosting service for
Tent. We'll also be launching a few apps in the coming months (Dropbox and
Droplr type apps powered by Tent). Until then most of the marketing copy is a
bit out of place and for most users the service isn't that useful (the Tent
app ecosystem isn't that mature yet).

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chm
Others have mentioned that you should be more descriptive about your product.
I have another suggestion:

The name and design of the site are at odds. Either change the design (show an
increasingly full plate of cupcakes?) or the name. A green tree is _not_ what
I was anticipating when I clicked on "cupcake.io".

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peter_l_downs
After reading the landing page, I still don't know what this is. Is it a
backup service?

~~~
adamnemecek
It's a tent.io ([https://tent.io/](https://tent.io/)) hosting service.
Basically, if I understand it correctly, tents are personal servers where
different applications run that can communicate with other tents. So for
example if there were a social networking application running on your tent, if
someone else viewed your profile, the data would come from your tent, not from
some third party server that you don't have access to. And this service
provides hosting of said tents. That's my understanding, someone correct me if
I'm wrong.

EDIT: Seems like I was not that far off.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tent_(protocol)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tent_\(protocol\))

~~~
eli
So the idea is it's app.net but storage instead of messaging?

~~~
jeena
I'd say it is app.net but not in the hands of one company but instead there is
a protocol and everyone can implement their own server and apps and run it on
their own.

In the end it would be like with email that you would have 5-10 big hosters
like gmail, hotmail, yahoo, some regional hosters like web.de, gmx and people
who host their own servers like me.

The thing is, the whole Tent thing is not really ready for other people then
curious developers. The protocol spec is in the making, most of the apps are
broken after the upgrade of the protocol from version 0.2 to 0.3 a couple of
days ago and need to be fixed, etc. It will at least take a couple of month
until it is usable.

It is not a good thing that cupcake (one of the hosters) are getting new users
because of this post because those users will be disappointed.

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danielsiders
One of the founders here-- We recently rebranded the service (used to be
[https://tent.is](https://tent.is)), which is still in alpha, to make the
distinction between the hosting service and the Tent protocol clearer. This
landing page was designed with some products that haven't launched yet in
mind, so most of the copy is vague outside of that context. Honestly we
weren't expecting any serious traffic until those apps launch later this year,
so we've been focused on product, not marketing. (Most of the team is
currently experiencing a power outage at home so we missed this being posted
to HN as well.)

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jackmaney
This is a terrible, terrible website. Not because of the design (which is
pretty), but because I have __absolutely no clue __what you 're offering. I
know that you want $5/month (for what? Who knows?), that you're expanding the
amount of storage that you have, and that "Cupcake is part of the growing Tent
ecosystem." Oh....okay....WHAT THE F@#K IS THAT?!

You know those annoying TV commercials where you're left with no idea what
product the commercial was trying to advertise? This is the web equivalent.
Just horrible.

~~~
th3byrdm4n
Apply directly to the forehead. Head-on Apply directly to the forehead.

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avalaunch
I so badly wanted this to be an api for ordering cupcakes.

From the description I couldn't tell what service is being sold but I'm fairly
sure it isn't an api for cupcakes. Damn.

~~~
Killswitch
Now I'm hungry for cupcakes. :(

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dmix
Design is aesthetically great but from skimming the copywriting (twice) I have
no idea what the product does.

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acjohnson55
True story here: it occurred to me that it would be awesome if there was a
customer-brings-their-own-storage protocol for cloud app backends. It would
allow arbitrary apps to stay synchronized across devices, but the user would
still control the data. And then I remembered that I was pretty sure I had
heard about something like this.

And then it hit me, it was the Cupcake/Tent thing I had read about a couple
weeks ago but had shrugged off because I didn't really understand the point
from either webpage.

I just took a second look, and it seems that Tent actually does everything I
had thought in my mind, but also goes well beyond, because it has a first-
class notion of sharing. Then I revisited Cupcake and saw that I had actually
overlooked the free tier when I first read this story.

Re-examining it all, I think this is absolutely revolutionary! Once people
understand that they can actually own all their own data for a couple bucks a
month and app writers realize they can achieve cloud synchronization with the
customer bringing their own infrastructure, it could be a major shift in the
whole multi-device app/social sharing economy. We can start seeing meta-apps
that aggregate app content.

But first, both Tent and Cupcake need to find a much better way to portray
what they provide, because neither site is capturing the promise...

~~~
danielsiders
We're currently redesigning and drafting copy for both sites. Any suggestions
would be appreciated.

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gburt
I have no idea what these guys are selling, but their website is beautiful.

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fingerprinter
Uhm. Ok?

Looked at page. No idea what I'm looking at.

Checked out Tent.io. Sorta understand.

Back to cupcake. Nope, thought I understood.

Sign up for free account. Still no idea. Oh well. Later.

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dallasgutauckis
"Everyday everyone creates more data by editing files, taking pictures, and
sending messages."

'Everyday' should be 'Every day'. 'Everyday' is an adjective.

~~~
jackmaney
Yes, but it's everyday data. _rimshot_

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jongraehl
So, they promise 50gb cloud storage for $5/mo (not initially, but after you
sign up and wait 4 years). That's about $5 at current S3 storage prices -
[http://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/](http://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/)

Why not "invest": unproven reliability and performance, uncertain future.

~~~
tux1968
That's not a very fair price comparison. You haven't added in the cost of data
transfers that you'll be charged with S3. And it seems transferring data from
your store to each of your application providers as needed, is the essential
point of the protocol & service.

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evolve2k
"© 2013 Tent.is, LLC. Tent is a trademark of Tent.is, LLC." Protocol name is
trademarked.

Good for the protocol or bad?

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sparkyrizzo
cupcake.is.ambiguous

