

Show HN: We built our startup in 100 days - Finbarr
https://giveit100.com/@100

======
3pt14159
I've been burned before by startups that got hacked and spammed all my twitter
friends. Sorry, normal signup or I'm not doing it.

Love the project though.

~~~
Finbarr
Thanks! We're definitely open to implementing our own login/accounts system
and I'm sure we'll do this sooner or later.

~~~
brickmort
Please do! The idea is awesome and I too am one to not use fb/twitter for
signing up. Call it being stubborn, but there's plenty of us out there. In the
meantime, is there a mailing list that people can join to stay up to date?

~~~
Finbarr
There is not currently a list unfortunately. Would be happy to let you know
when we release non social login - ping me at finbarr[]giveit100[]com :-)

------
PaulJoslin
Fantastic work. I really hope pg has accepted your application to ycombinator.
You clearly have a talent for hard work, perseverance and knowing how to
market your product well. Even if pg doesn't like the idea, he should realise
the team is very capable.

I have a question though Karen, did you know you were going to do this project
before you created this video
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w)
? (I originally saw it on r/GetMotivated when it went viral originally) or did
you decide to build it due to the popularity that the video got and the
requests from people wanting to achieve similar?

(Just curious from a marketing point of view whether you planned for the dance
video to go viral to boost your idea or whether you saw an untapped market due
to the popularity of the video and decided to fill it)

\----

[EDIT] - Just got my question answered by watching this :
[http://youtu.be/syoqjYLDs48?t=9m57s](http://youtu.be/syoqjYLDs48?t=9m57s) \-
I'm glad that it was an idea that came out of the viral consequence of the
original video, rather than the original plan all along.

Also just realised that the woman learning to walk video I saw today on
r/GetMotivated was submitted by you / part of the same project.

I can see pg's mind turning over in the office hours video, trying to
understand the concept and how big it can grow - I think he's right in the
fact that you should see how people use it and allow yourselves to pivot if
another idea emerges out of where you're at so far.

I guess the issue is that one of the reasons for the successful popularity of
your original dancing video was that it had a nice balance of unique story,
being told in a short enough manner that the viewer keeps watching, combined
with the final scene coming together perfectly with the music / train /
nailing the dance which in my opinion was the 're share' moment - where the
user thinks 'I must re share this!'.

The problem is in the 10 second videos it's unlikely I'll want to 're share a
single video' \- so it's the compiled story at the end which becomes the thing
I want to share as a user - but that's not automated / easy to produce. That
said, I did enjoy watching the journey of you guys producing the product in
100 days (10 second clip at a time) so, in a world of transparency and people
wanting free publicity it does seem to work. (infact I would happily continue
watching the journey for 10 seconds a day, to continue the journey past launch
out of interest to see what happens next).

Either way, both you and Finbarr have produced, marketed and launched a cool
product in 100 days which is a pretty amazing feat in itself.

~~~
karenxcheng
Thank you so much, Paul. Your excitement is contagious. Our YC interview is on
Thursday. Fingers crossed we get in.

------
citricsquid
This is such a cool idea. What's the reasoning behind limiting the video
length? Quite a few people appear to get cut off in their videos before they
have a chance to document their progress.

This one is good, 60+ days of coding:
[https://giveit100.com/@joanne](https://giveit100.com/@joanne)

~~~
karenxcheng
Thank you! We restricted it to 10 seconds to help keep the videos interesting.
We definitely need a better way to trim the videos though. We'd like to build
a mobile app that makes it very easy to select which 10s of the video you'd
like. For now, it just uses the first 10s.

~~~
izendejas
Though this will tie you onto a different platform at least initially, have
you considered integrating with vine/instagram in any way? Could be a good way
to acquire more users.

Best of luck helping people achieve more.

~~~
karenxcheng
That's a great idea, we'd love to do some importing from vine/instagram, e.g.
with #giveit100 hashtags

------
beambot
Oh yeah... these guys did office hours on stage for Startup School 2013:
[http://youtu.be/syoqjYLDs48?t=9m57s](http://youtu.be/syoqjYLDs48?t=9m57s)

~~~
karenxcheng
Yeah! I'll post that video into our meta 100.

------
TheBiv
Some people on here are probably going to flame this idea because it glorifies
someone showing off what they are doing, but I think they are missing the
point: this is just a tool to keep yourself accountable (a la the Seinfeld
calendar).

Feature suggestion (that is probably already in your pipeline): Add the
ability for friends to join groups and do something together for 100 days and
keep count of their friends who also keep on doing X for 100 days. If I just
stumbled on this site, I would probably say "Cool" and then I would never come
back bc I don't have anything right now that I would dedicate 100 days to. It
seems like the tricky part for y'all will be to get people to realize that
your platform is broad, but they are specific and they can find use in this
platform right now.

Oh yeah, Congratulations on launching and good luck!

~~~
gen_narcissists
>> it glorifies someone showing off what they are doing.

Yes. You, Sir, are EXACTLY Right. I think it's called Narcissism, and there's
plenty of that going around with this Generation obsessed with Instagram
(taking #selfies and posting it for the whole world to see), Facebook (showing
off how awesome their fake life is) etc.

~~~
l0gicpath
How about if you get a real life of your own instead of worrying about others
fake lives?

I believe the concept is called live and let live.

------
MichaelTieso
I love everything about this. It was fun watching your videos and how far you
progressed over the 100 days. Even more fun to see that made the last video
about the post right here on HN.

Okay, I just went to your front page and as soon as I saw your subway shot, I
remembered your dance
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w).
Nicely done!

Congrats!

~~~
boyter
That was the first thought I had. "She looks familiar" check the front page
and instantly knew who it was.

I love this idea and the implementation is pretty slick. Hope the exposure
from the dance video helps push this along. Best of luck.

BTW I would sign up, but I won't do it via facebook or twitter. If you add a
normal email password I will be in.

------
baoist
Since this does seem to have roots in the Seinfeld calendar methodology, are
there plans to have a before/after of the 100 days? It would probably be more
quantifiable and inspirational to see the ends as well as the spectrum.

This will be a great social and personal tool for keeping people (hopefully
myself) more accountable for my commitment to learn. Wonderful work.

~~~
karenxcheng
Finbarr's co-founder here. I personally love the Seinfeld method and use Lift
to help with that. We want to make videos of before/after, but with the whole
journey. We've made a video of one of our users, who is re-learning how to
walk:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHSMUq0bDLg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHSMUq0bDLg)

------
christiangenco
This is fantastic! Such a good idea, and a very clever way to launch it. As I
was browsing through the videos (very intuitive interface), I was wondering
why I hadn't heard of this "giveit100" site before. Hit me midway through that
these were videos of you developing the site I was looking at, and by then I
was already on board.

A few things:

* There were details in some of the videos that I wish I could've full-screened to see, but I don't know of a good way to do that from a UX perspective. Keeping video transition delay to a minimum I think would be key.

* This method of auto-playing videos onmouseover is brilliant. Good job Finbarr.

* I think at its core, this is a video Seinfeld calendar. I want to feel some kind of social pressure for skipping a day.

Again, great job, and congrats on the launch! It looks like you had an
excellent time making it.

------
acoyfellow
I love the concept, and I dig the "no-click" style of watching. Makes for a
very nice UX.

I hope there can be some good stories that come from it.. but what happens if
someone starts being inconsistent with their project? I wonder how many people
will fully complete the 100 days

~~~
Finbarr
Thanks for checking it out. Missing days is fine, in fact lots of people have
gaps. We've only been running the project for a few months and already have a
few people who have reached 100 days. Lots more are fast approaching.

------
nathas
Any chance I can use this with OpenId or sign up for an individual account
some time soon? I really hate using my social accounts to sign in. I know it's
probably super low priority.

I think it's a pretty neat idea :)

------
cocoflunchy
I love the hover to play video! Simplicity of a gif without the horrible
loading of everything at once.

Small heads up: many of the avatars are not loading on the front page.

Good luck!

~~~
Finbarr
Thanks! Yea AFAIK twitter doesn't provide a uniform endpoint anymore just for
retrieving profile image url. I need to write a script that will periodically
fetch the "fully hydrated" user and update the profile.

Unless there's another way...?

------
superbeefy
Mouseover video playback its kinda crappy when your scrolling, if your mouse
cursor is crossing over several videos you just keep hearing too many random
sounds. Also since everything is recorded at different volumes it makes my
ears bleed.

~~~
Finbarr
Sorry the experience has been sub-par. What browser and OS are you using? It
works best on Chrome and Safari and the scrolling is typically smooth in those
environments.

~~~
superbeefy
I'm running chrome. Scrolling speed isn't the issue. When you have the mouse
cursor on the page and you start scrolling down, if your cursor crosses
through a video it will start playing. As you keep scrolling down you'll be
moving in and out of videos causing less the a second of playback to occur.

Now since these videos are user generated they are all recorded with various
levels of quality. If your mouse moving through ones that are poorly recorded
that split second of playback sounds horrible.

You can simulate the effect if you visit
[https://giveit100.com/@Benjamin](https://giveit100.com/@Benjamin) and goto
the day 18. If your move your mouse past it you'll hear some really bad static
for a split second. Now imagine if all the videos are like that while
scrolling down the page, it's a pretty horrible experience.

~~~
Finbarr
Ok got it. Thanks for the feedback. I think I can probably do something to
prevent playback triggered by scroll events.

------
ecesena
It looks pretty weird on Safari - "html5: Video file not found" on all videos.

~~~
Finbarr
Hmm that's really weird - sorry about that. What version of Safari and OSX are
you using?

~~~
ecesena
I have Safari Version 7.0 (9537.71) on Mavericks. I don't think I have strange
config/filters...

------
jcklnruns
I love this idea so much and you two really owned those clips! It's so rare to
get a glimpse of how a startup went from day 1 to day 100 on this level. And
it looks like you had fun! :)

~~~
karenxcheng
Thank you!

------
SandersAK
It's like you took all the best parts of Evr.st, but stripped away all the
pretentious bullshit because you're genuinely into the idea.

So yeah. It's awesome. Congrats!

------
pla3rhat3r
I think this is a great idea. However, I'd like to see a follow up. I'd like
to see how they do in their first year, first 5 years, etc. Wish them luck!

------
kgmpers
One critique of your site design, I don't know if it's just me, but infinite
scrolling can be frustrating. I was trying to get to the "About" section in
the footer but it kept running away from me.

[http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2013/05/03/infinite-
scr...](http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2013/05/03/infinite-scrolling-
get-bottom/)

~~~
Finbarr
Ah yes, I meant to remove the footer from the pages with infinite scroll -
sorry about that and thanks for reminding me!

------
kamilszybalski
Such a cool idea, congrats on your early traction. It reminds me of that video
I recently saw of the dude who filmed a few seconds of each day for xdays.

~~~
Finbarr
Thankyou! Yea I've seen a few things like that recently. One other interesting
one is the 1 second every day app[1].

[1] [http://1secondeveryday.com/](http://1secondeveryday.com/)

~~~
kamilszybalski
Thanks for sharing

------
highCs
Well, to say everything I was sceptic. Then I saw your video of you learning
to dance - you should definitely look at that if you didn't already. After one
year your progresses are absolutely awesome. That's what worked for me with
the video and what might worked too with giveit100: see people starting from
scratch and then become awesome into something. Good luck, that's pretty cool.

------
lylemckeany
Very cool idea. I would change the functionality of the commenting system. I'd
like to see the comments on the same page as all the videos, rather than
clicking through to a new page. I think it would have the nice side-effect of
more engagement with the comments. They're also not super obvious at first as
I found myself looking around for a comment button of some sort.

------
aarondf
Small bit of feedback: If the browser window is big enough to not have to
scroll on the first load, the infinite scroll doesn't kick in at all. I looked
around for a solid minute trying to find a "next" button. Came back here and
saw an "infinite scroll" comment, resized my browser, and loaded again. which
solved it for me.

Other than that, very cool!

~~~
cjstewart88
That was the only thing I came back to comment about. I wanted to keep
browsing and couldn't figure out how until I resized the window and infinite
scroll kicked in.

I think this is an awesome idea, grats on launching!

~~~
Finbarr
Ah no way - good catch! I'll code up a fix - thanks for bringing this to my
attention.

------
zura
Any infrastructure or implementation details for HN userbase? Like where do
you store videos (S3?), approximate costs, etc...

------
vojant
I like this idea. I started around week ago, recording short movies (5-20 sec)
from every day of work on my latest project. It help me stay focus. That's why
I think your app may help people like me to record their projects. But I won't
create account because I won't login with Twitter/Facebook...

------
jypepin
I love the idea, the design is simple and it's really nice to go through the
videos of people, really inspiring!

------
rmoriz
The @ in the url kills twitter's url shortener (on OSX desktop app) when deep-
linking to a specific day…

~~~
Finbarr
Alright I managed to fix this. Had to write some pretty dirty route hacks in
rails to get around the problem, but such is life.

------
codygman
The videos loading all at once crashed my ubuntu computer with the newest
version of firefox :/

It also totally bogged down my subpar internet connection since I would hover
over a video to check it out, then scroll down, but the video would still be
loading.

------
languagehacker
This is cute, but I don't understand how it's going to make money.

~~~
erikpukinskis
I don't know what they're thinking, but in general with an aspirational
product like this I don't think it should be too hard. They could very easily
market classes, books, all kinds of stuff to their users to help them reach
their goals.

... as opposed to something like Facebook or Twitter, where people are mostly
just looking for entertainment or inf0. To me the monetizeability here is a
lot easier to trust.

------
MatthewB
Good job Finbar+crew. :)

------
codeoclock
That's awesome! :D

------
Raisin
This is awesome and I love the idea. I tend to document what I am working on,
dating sketches looking back at old projects. This is perfect. Thanks.

~~~
Finbarr
Awesome - hope to see you on the site soon!

------
nubela
Grattis Finbarr!

/Steven from Videoplaza

~~~
Finbarr
Tack Steven! :-)

------
GhiGt
Great idea!

What do you think about the possibility to have several projects for the same
account?

Good luck

------
gsaines
Congrats on the launch guys, looking great! Hope that we see you in this YC
batch!

------
hkbarton
This is AWESOME!Good hacking

~~~
Finbarr
Thanks! It has been a blast.

------
jackgolding
I'd like a RSS feed of people I follow :D

------
AznHisoka
How did you seed the site with so many videos?

~~~
karenxcheng
I got a bunch of emails from people who had seen my dance video, and invited
them to do the 100-day challenge. The earliest version of 100 was people
sharing videos with us via dropbox folders.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daC2EPUh22w)

~~~
boyter
Classic case of increasing your luck surface area
[http://www.codusoperandi.com/posts/increasing-your-luck-
surf...](http://www.codusoperandi.com/posts/increasing-your-luck-surface-area)

------
skizm
Mouseover playing videos. Not cool man.

------
gen_narcissists
Why is this generation so obsessed with "documenting" everything instead of
actually "doing"?

STOP Documenting. START DO-ing!

~~~
malcolmmcc
Wow, you made a new account just for this?

I think what Give It 100 does is that they take away a lot of the overhead
from documenting so that you can focus more on the doing. Like, it lets you be
publicly accountable for your progress in a simple and enjoyable way, without
needing like... a youtube account?

~~~
gen_narcissists
Recording, editing and posting the video takes as much (if not more time) than
the activity. No?

~~~
malcolmmcc
Did you even watch any of the videos? They're like 10 seconds and not edited.
If you're not spending more than 10 seconds on your actual activity... I...
don't even.

