

TinyProj connects developers, designers, etc. with paid, short-term projects. - jmonegro
http://kylewritescode.com/post/10224111214/i-just-launched-tinyproj-the-latest-in-my-line-of

======
Mizza
I've noticed this need as well, and launched something similar:
<http://gun.io>

It's free for Open Source, and a 10% fee for non-Free projects. Winner-take-
all!

Hopefully we'll both work to create a culture which helps independent
developers help each other. Good luck! Email me if you're interested in
collaboration.

~~~
omarish
This space is interesting. A friend and I have been doing a weekend project in
the same space: <http://casualcontracting.com>. Similar idea, but listing a
project is free and it's invite-only for developers.

We'd definitely be interested in talking with you guys as well. Email is in my
profile.

~~~
frankdenbow
Agreed. My friend and I also did FindAHacker.com, which looked to serve side
projects and co-founding opportunities. Down to talk to you all also!

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jasonkester
How is this different than the ten thousand established freelance sites it's
competing with? Everything from guru to odesk to rentacoder to scriptlance
already does what this does, as well as handling payment and rating
developers.

The Freelance game has plenty of problems, but frankly a shortage of places to
post jobs is not one of them.

~~~
kylebragger
Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, though I'm focusing specifically on _short-term_
work. It's also a set it and forget it scenario for the talent -- they just
get stuff delivered. At the end of the day, it's an experiment and something
interesting to work on that could benefit my day job, Forrst, pretty
substantially.

~~~
jasonkester
> I'm focusing specifically on short-term work

Exactly my point. So are those ten thousand bottom scraper sites I mention.

What I'm asking is how you intend to stop the same people who post their
"Groupon Clone: $500 budget" nonsense on those 'lance sites off your list?

And how you're planning to stop the 100-500 "sir, we are professional
A++++++++ software firm. we review your project and are ready to start
immediately" responses that will be auto-spammed to every job on your list?

Those are actually good problems to solve, and a site that solved them would
be a great win for the small fraction of freelance work that's actually
conducted above board by talented developers and non-flaky clients. But a
quick spin through what you've presented here makes it seem like your quick &
dirty approach will actually amplify those problems.

~~~
kylebragger
Both great questions.

On the project side, I hand approve every post. Spam/recruiter junk/etc. gets
deleted and the email address blacklisted.

For the talent side, yes, you're right; there's a good potential for A++++++++
firm nonsense.

The quick and dirty approach is probably not accurately reflecting the work
I've put in/will be putting in behind the scenes, through methods we've
developed at Forrst for dealing with reputation, throttling one's ability to
mass-contact project owners, anonymizing email on both sides with a one-click
"this is spam" function, and so forth.

Ultimately, I agree -- they're great (and hard) problems to solve, and I'm
eager to do so.

~~~
pavel_lishin
> On the project side, I hand approve every post. Spam/recruiter junk/etc.
> gets deleted and the email address blacklisted.

Do you have a plan for scaling that up? ("I'm gonna hire more warm bodies" is
an acceptable answer, imo.)

~~~
kylebragger
Heh, honestly that's probably what I'll do. We (Forrst) can certainly share
the load if/when it becomes necessary.

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nhangen
Kyle, huge fan, and we've talked via Skype in the past, so I hope you don't
take this the wrong way, but I'm curious...why not create this as part of
Forrst instead of as a separate venture? It seems like you could get some
reach, while also adding value to the people paying a monthly supporter fee.

I think this service looks great, but I'm bummed that it was integrated as a
supporter benefit.

Edit: I see now that it _is_ a benefit to Forrst members, but in the opposite
way I had predicted. Any plans to allow the trading of acorns for job posts?
Sometimes it's nice to have backup on projects :)

~~~
kylebragger
We can't really release the kind of quick, experimental MVP projects that I'm
such a fan of on Forrst since we've got 40k people who will notice a lack of
polish and so forth. I wanted to vet this idea quickly without the overhead of
expectations from the community. That's not to say this won't be rolled back
in somehow. That's a good idea about Acorns, I'll put some thought into it :)
And no worries -- totally appreciate the question's directness.

~~~
nhangen
That makes a lot of sense Kyle, appreciate the candor.

------
kylebragger
I'm pretty excited about this. If you submit a project, mention HN and I'll
give you 50% off the first one.

~~~
chime
Really neat interface. Also thanks for making developer/designer/copywriter
checkboxes instead of radio.

Update: I just received an email with URL to edit my profile without having to
create/remember password. Very neat but one problem: It's http. You really
should make that https, especially when you start dealing with paying
customers.

~~~
kylebragger
Heh, I literally just received my SSL certs a few minutes ago. Hang tight.

------
ericHosick
Hi. I added a project.

Few points:

    
    
      * Are Incremental Days Necessary(1-21)? 1,2,3,7,14,31 maybe? Also, up to 1 month?
    
      * The 1000 character limit thing was a pain.
    

Good luck on your project. Lets see if you are able to find someone for our
project.

~~~
kylebragger
Thanks for the feedback! I actually had the first item written down, and the
more I mull it over the more it makes sense.

------
DanielStraight
I signed up. Loved the simplicity of it all. I also love how I can just sit
back and watch what comes through passively without having to go search
through stuff. No idea if I'll actually take any projects, but I'm definitely
a fan of the interface.

------
mixmastamyk
An odd comment I know but this is the second time Ive seen "made in NYC" today
in the footer of a webpage. Don't know what to make of it. Perhaps I'll add
made in Tijuana to mine?

~~~
carterschonwald
clicking on the corresponding link on forrest yields this site
<http://nytm.org/made/>

enjoy

~~~
jarin
Oh I like that idea, just registered sdcrafted.com to do something similar for
San Diego.

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dendory
They send an email every Saturday? That seems somewhat.. not very useful. A
site with a list of projects and the number of interested bids and such would
work much better.

~~~
prawn
Captive audience they can push messages to. Also, only need to moderate once a
week rather than live. Pretty smart.

~~~
kylebragger
Thanks. We'll see how it works out, but yes, that was the intention. I get 6
days to moderate and queue up projects for the next email. Plus, I like the
idea of a low/no-effort set up for the talent side -- they get an email they
can skim at their leisure, no browsing around and trawling for job listings on
a site.

------
mise
Congrats on this, very smart (you've kept it simple).

Is this a good way to get designers, I wonder? The alternative that seems that
it might work better, browsing portfolios and contacting your favourite
designers, as written by Andrew: [http://andrewseddon.com/post/3402344430/how-
to-find-a-design...](http://andrewseddon.com/post/3402344430/how-to-find-a-
designer)

~~~
kylebragger
Thanks very much. That was indeed the goal.

As to whether this works the way I'm anticipating, only time will tell! I'm
predicting, though, that this works as a nice adjunct to directly contacting
designers (or anyone else) -- you never know who you're missing, after all. If
I've learned one thing from Forrst, it's that for every well-known designer
(or developer) out there, there are scores of undiscovered, awesome designers
waiting to knock it out of the park on your project.

------
paul9290
Im in the mist of starting up a digital agency with friends. We are all
creative and or technical people. Our weak point is a lack of strong sales
skills to secure sizable business contracts.

I was thinking of creating a site like sales guy/gal meet development/designer
team. Maybe this exists already?

~~~
kylebragger
Interesting idea. Happy to brainstorm about that - kyle at forrst.com

~~~
paul9290
Cool I sent you an email. Cheers, Ryan

------
ThomPete
Congrats Kyle and welcome to the world of very small projects.

Maybe we can help each other out :)

~~~
kylebragger
And totally. Email me anytime.

------
B-Scan
Got my first mail. It's great! Nice job. Only one thing: it will be good that
links in the mail open some preview page where you click on "Connect" button.
Didn't expect CCing on link click.

------
pacomerh
I personally like the idea of getting the listings on email. Having the list
of jobs online seems more vulnerable for spam. Let's see how it evolves.
Thanks

------
grotm001
I was about to use it for several projects when I realized I have no idea who
I'm going to working with on the projects. Is it 1-on-1 all the time?

~~~
jmonegro
Well, your request for work gets sent to all the relevant subscribers (i.e. if
you need a developer, to all the developers on the list).

The ones interested make it known and then you can get in contact with them
and decide who you wanna work for.

------
OneWhoFrogs
What does TinyProj offer that WeekendHacker doesn't? The latter is free and
has six times as many subscribers.

~~~
jmonegro
> six times as many subscribers

For now. As TinyProj and when it taps into the Forrst userbase, you'll be
looking at a solid, skillful, and numerous candidates.

~~~
kylebragger
FWIW we're about to hit 7k subscribers.

------
pud
How confidential is it? If I submit a project: A) who will get to read about
the project? B) will everyone who can see the listing also see my name?

I'm in semi-stealth. I want few people to know what my project is, and nobody
to know that it's mine (except the designer).

~~~
kylebragger
Anyone can read about it, but you're free to use a pseudonym and generic email
address. There is craigslist-style email anonymity, so you get to obscure your
identity as long as you'd like to.

------
bwooce
It may also help to specify the currency(s) involved...yes we'll all assume
it's USD for now.

~~~
kylebragger
Good catch.

------
gsharma
I like the idea, but I would feel a lot more comfortable about "1,000 rad
folks" if the site gives an idea of what kind of these people are. For
instance, these are top 250 users in the category on Forrst. Sample profiles
would help as well.

~~~
kylebragger
You're totally right, and I'm working on that as fast as I can.

------
parallel
I'm interesting in submitting a project but I don't know how much to offer for
it. In a "marketplace" you get to see what other people are offering and
what's being accepted. I'd like to see this sort of information.

------
mrschwabe
Cool project. I have a similar idea but one that is based on hours, not cash.

------
athst
I like this idea a lot. I wish you could just view the listings on the site
instead of having to wait for a weekly email. That's what I was expecting, and
having to wait is just annoying.

~~~
jmonegro
It's probable that this will be implemented in the future, depending on other
users' feedback.

------
etdebruin
I registered itppl.com YEARS ago for something similar to this but never got
it started. Good job :)

------
DallaRosa
Cool just registered as a developer and should registering a project soon :)

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thom_r
any geographical limitations ? (say I'm in EU, project is in the US, etc ..) I
suppose it will have to be dealt separately for each project or ?

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RMacy
This has a lot of potential -- signed up -- good job!

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corroded
i am confused as to why you just didn't take a screenshot...you actually
"shot" your screen...

In any case, signed up :P great idea btw

~~~
kylebragger
Bad/inside joke. People are doing that on Forrst a bunch, so it was more of a
nod/friendly jab at them.

Thanks btw! :)

~~~
olliesaunders
It looks better that way anyway.

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perfunctory
How do you deal with spam?

~~~
kylebragger
All projects are approved by a human, and on the talent side fake emails that
bounce are automatically removed.

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geoffc
Nice idea. Good luck!

~~~
kylebragger
Thanks!

------
iklavya
How is this different from elance.com and scriptlance.com?

