

Ask HN: Review my "coming soon" page - mhluongo
http://scholr.ly/coming-soon

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terrellm
Pardon the unsolicited suggestion but you may want to reconsider your domain
name.

I'm not sure how academics would be on misspelling "scholar" even if it's a
clever URL hack. It's sort of like wearing a suit with sleeves too long and
pant legs too short to your job at a fashion designer - it just doesn't fit in
that context. That's just my opinion.

Also, there's another site at scholar.ly that has its own coming soon page.

~~~
mhluongo
I've reached out to the owner of scholar.ly, but he isn't interested in
selling. This is an ongoing contention with us- do you think it'd be valuable,
considering the time tradeoff, to survey grad students and test a few names?

~~~
terrellm
When I was in a similar situation a few months back, I chose to find another
option rather than running the risk of confusion by my customers with me on
the losing end.

While instinctive for many HN'ers, remembering to misspell and use .ly is an
unnecessary burden for people like parents and non-tech friends. In my case,
the average age of someone in my market is 50+ so I went with a .com.

A disclaimer is that I do invest some in domain names on the side.
Unfortunately I hadn't bought this particular name years ago so had to pay
$1500 for it.

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rorymarinich
The font you use for your tag line is too silly — it doesn't make me feel
particularly learned or wise or any of the things I associate with
scholarliness. Ditto that wishy-washy blue color.

The "email-subscribe" widget is ugly and gray. The border is too thick on the
"email" and the slightly rounded "subscribe" box feels like a parody of web
2.0.

"to get updates on our progress" should not be on a separate line from
"subscribe" but in general it should not be there at all. Think of a more
concise way to say what you want to say.

The "h" and the "r" in your logo font make me want to punch a baby even though
said baby has done nothing wrong. I don't know what font that is but it makes
me feel kind of like the bondage rape scene in Blue Velvet makes me feel.

"We're taking it back" should not be on a separate line from "The internet was
built...", nor should it be in bold.

So inasmuch as "coming soon" pages go, you managed to incorporate all the
things you're supposed to have while simultaneously making them all very
unpleasant. But why is this posted here? Why does it matter? Is this an
attempt to make us subscribe and build up your prelaunch audience? Or are you
a designer trying to master the art of coming soon pages? Otherwise I don't
know why you'd care enough to ask for a critique.

(Also: WAS the Internet built for universities? What does that even mean? Do
you mean the old old Internet that started as a university project? Or do you
mean 2005-era Facebook? I am so confused. Please explain.)

~~~
mhluongo
(Also: the old old Internet. Any ideas on how to make that more clear?)

~~~
rorymarinich
I'm still confused myself; the Internet hasn't been restricted to university
usage since the way-early 90s, right? What specific service are you providing?
Without that I can't be more clear.

(If it's something you'd rather keep secret, I understand, but can't exactly
help much. Or if you want to talk privately, send an email and I'll try to get
back to you quickly.)

------
kingsidharth
Build it then it will be more logical to ask for review. Ideas and Coming Soon
pages are of no value.

------
_grrr
What do you want us to review?

~~~
mhluongo
I'm really interested in initial impressions - "the brown/blue is ugly", "like
the copy, wish there was more explanation", etc.

~~~
_grrr
I think the browns is ugly and the fonts need some work.

Seems like a bit of a waste getting the HN community to review some colours
and fonts though. If you told us a little more about the idea maybe we could
give you feedback on that instead? I mean, the coming soon page is pretty
insignificant with respects to the idea itself, no?

------
mhluongo
We're building an academic network to provide academics with papers and people
relevant to their research. Please let me know what you think.

~~~
chunkbot
I really like the tag line ("The Internet was built for Universities. We're
taking it back.").

The design sucks, but at least it's functional.

You should explain what the product does (ie. put some variation of the above
text on the page?).

Also, maybe you should consider a "better" domain name...

~~~
mhluongo
Jumping on giving an explanation of the product. I was hoping to go for
mysterious, but most people I've talked to think that's silly.

I don't love the design- we're still working on a logo- but is there anything
in particular jumping out at you?

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corp
You should explain what the product does (or will do) so I have an incentive
to be on your mailing list.

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deutronium
The text "The internet was built for" is overlapped by "universities"

~~~
mhluongo
Is it? What browser/resolution are you using?

~~~
deutronium
Firefox 3.6.12 1366x768

Feel free to give me an e-mail if you want a screenshot too.

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jscore
How about: Review my "Ask HN: Review my "coming soon" page (scholr.ly)" post?

~~~
mhluongo
I'm new to (posting on) HN, so those responses are great, too.

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cancelbubble
Horrible fonts. Horrible tagline.

I have no idea what you do, why would I want to get updates on your progress?

