
Voxli (YC W09) Targets Gamers With Browser-Based Group Voice Chat - andrewow
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/09/y-combinators-voxli-targets-gamers-with-browser-based-group-voice-chat/
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vaksel
Congrats on getting techcrunch coverage, you guys should do something with the
heyzap guys, there are plenty of multiplayer flash games out there, and this
would work together perfectly.

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markbao
Cool! Congratulations, Voxli!

If any Hacker News people want to hang out, go here:
<https://voxli.com/hackernews>

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andrewow
There are a couple of us in there now =)

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wayne
Having to install a plugin is kind of annoying, but Voxli is one of the
simplest-to-setup, easiest-to-use voice chats I've ever used. Inviting someone
to a chat via a URL is really convenient and I could really see this taking
off.

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joey
Glad you find it simple. We don't like installing plugins easier, but gamers
need certain features that we couldn't provide with what's built into Flash--
like push-to-talk from any application.

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DarkShikari
Here's my advice as someone who used to play a number of MMOGs. There are
three very important aspects to a voice communication system which vary in
importance based on the particular game:

1\. Latency and quality. These factors affect whether other players can hear
you in time, and whether they can understand what they heard. These are very
important for fast-paced situations where you can't afford to repeat yourself,
a simple example being arena combat in WoW. _Ventrilo is almost always used
over Teamspeak for these situations_. These sort of high-tension situations
rarely have more than ~40 people involved, since once a group reaches a
certain size the latency of the entire groups' action becomes higher than the
latency of any voice chat.

2\. Management. Can you mute people who are causing problems? Can you have a
"commander-only" voice system to communicate between a few people in a channel
without the others hearing? Can you kick people and ban spies? Is this all
easy to do?

3\. Scale. While Ventrilo is widely used in WoW, Teamspeak is used in EVE
Online almost exclusively. Why? The reason is scale--there are often fleets of
100, 200, 500, or more players and the voice chat system needs to handle at
the minimum a broadcast from a single commander to all of them.

Without the appropriate level of effectiveness in these categories, you won't
be able to compete with existing apps.

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markessien
Why are you using an install program? Why not sign an applet and do something
from there? Or use flash? Having a .msi file to install is a bit annoying.
Also, your install should show some notification that it's complete.
Currently, the install just disappears, making it tough to know if it even
started.

Also, there is no background noise, so it's difficult to know if the program
is working at all if nobody is talking (like in the HN room).

Furthermore, pushing the push-to-talk button causes behaviour I don't
understand. The button pops up, then disappears again. What does that mean? Is
it now on? I can't tell.

And finally, clicking the "Add room" button causes a strange message about the
room that is not clear at all what it means. Am I now in multiple rooms? Do I
own the room? If so, where is the list of rooms I'm in.

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thegoleffect
Making a plugin or a separate install program enables the user to use Push-To-
Talk functionality while their browser is not in focus. AFAIK, there isn't a
solid way around that. I'm sure if you or someone else had an brilliant
solution, they'd make use of it at voxli.

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henning
I'll be very impressed if they can peel a particular segment of gamers away
from Ventrilo.

World of Warcraft has voice chat built right in to the game but no one uses
it. You would think Blizzard doing voice chat would wipe out third party
competitors; the precise opposite is true.

Also, dealing with whiny teenage gamers as users is enough to make anyone want
to kill themselves. Exhibit A: the WoW forums, which are actually stupider
than YouTube comments.

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potatolicious
There are a lot of games that need voice chat that do not have it. Most other
MMOs come to mind - there is plenty of starving market before you even get to
the behemoth that is WoW.

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thegoleffect
Our team applied to YC with this idea so we know there are a lot of prickly
issues that come up along the way. Best of luck to you guys!

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rokhayakebe
Verdict:"Made something USEFUL"

If the hotkey could be restricted to work only when the window/tab is active,
I can see several people using it to communicate within an office environment
(or for remote teams).

Frankly that will countless IM pings or having to walk to the next office.

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joey
Glad to hear you find it useful! I would recommending binding it to a key you
rarely use, like the right control key on Windows, or a weird combo like
Control-Shift-A on Mac.

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emmett
Fun fact: Control-Shift-A activates the subversion menu from TextMate on OSX,
which I use all the time. It is a pretty random key sequence though :-)

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staunch
IDEA: Let me tell it to connect to an existing Ventrillo/TeamSpeak server.

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thegoleffect
I'm sure they're working on it. Ventrilo uses a proprietary protocol that,
afaik, has not been broken down yet completely.

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nirmal
Would really love this for live video. I know that it doesn't really make
sense for gamers but I think their is a nice market in impromptu virtual
conference rooms created by sharing a URL.

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timbowen
Looks like an excellent product, what is the plan to generate revenue?

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brianmckenzie
Why is it calling me RoyalPerson?

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andrewow
When you join, you get a randomly generated name (we thought it would be more
interesting than "Guest1234")

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JMiao
firefox 3 is slow enough as it is, so i never install plugins.

voxli popped by firefox cherry.

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ycsn
congrats on launch

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thepanister
Congratulations, and good luck. It looks very interesting.

You are using flash. Can you please use SwfObject, so users with high security
in their browsers, don't have to click on the flash to activate it? I hope you
understand what I mean.

SwfObject project is here: <http://code.google.com/p/swfobject/>

Thanks in advance.

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joey
We in fact are using swfobject.... Could you please file a bug report from
inside any chat room by clicking on "feedback" so we can capture your browser
information? Thanks. I'll double-check to make sure we've got the latest code.

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thepanister
When I visited the website's homepage, I had to click on the flash to activate
it. Anyway I will report it.

EDIT: I am using Internet explorer 7, on windows XP.

EDIT: [It works fine in Google Chrome, whatever... maybe the problem happens
because you move the user to https link? I am not sure, but could this be a
reason?]

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ajkirwin
A question. If I have to install an external program ANYWAY, why not just..
use something outside of the browser?

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thegoleffect
Making in the browser makes it a little bit easier to support all the various
operating systems not to mention form factors (e.g. smart phones too.).

