
Show HN: Callwarden - jakswa
https://www.callwarden.com
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capsulecorp
I hate things that want you to sign up for a free trial without showing what
pricing will be after the trial is up. Not willing to to register and start
giving out the number to people only to find out the cost is completely
unreasonable. Transparency please.

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jakswa
Thanks for pointing this out. I personally overlooked it. I added it right
below the header for now -- maybe it'll move if I can figure out better
placement for it.

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capsulecorp
Thanks for adding the price, I'm actually quite surprised at how reasonable it
is. I was expecting an arm an a leg when i saw the prices were omitted,
pleasant surprise and will def give it a shot.

A few quick questions:

1.Are there any plans for price guarantees or annual subscriptions; something
to protect early adopters from a price increase soon after momentum builds?

2.Do we get to choose our numbers or their area code?

3.Can you provide a basic rundown or links to the data collection/privacy
polices

4.What is the protocol for exporting our data? Say I want to stop using Call
Warden but want to keep my messages, can I download my messages en masse?

Thanks in advance, this looks like a useful idea, I wish you the best on the
project.

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jakswa
Sorry for the delay in responding, and thanks for asking these -- good
questions to think about and get down. I'm gonna just answer with what I got
in my head, as a web developer who is working on this:

1\. Annual subscriptions is a good idea. Right now we're just seeing if this
thing has legs. I didn't consider that people would want to pay a year up
front. We are hoping we pegged the average costs per customer accurately.
These are well-defined systems with fixed prices, but users are un-
predictable. If, on average, users generate way more voicemails than we
expected, I don't think we'd have a choice but to reconsider our pricing, or
shut down maybe. This ties into your #4 question -- I'd want to make sure
everyone could port out their numbers if they want, and collect all their
recordings + trancriptions in that event.

2\. Right now the number you get is a random US number. This was just a "get
it done quick" decision. We'd just need to figure out a good UI for picking
your area code, to tack it on. I only hesitate here because if users want a
specific area code, in my head that's getting into other product territories
(vanity numbers, "local business" numbers, etc), and we're trying to silo
ourselves into consumer market (not B2B, there are other products for B2B).
We'd also be limited by number availability at the carrier -- maybe it doesn't
have the area code you want, kind of thing. Other than that, I don’t think
we're against the idea.

3\. Right now we store to/from values, duration values, transcription text,
and recording files that start when the beep is heard. This data is under
lock-and-key in S3 and in a postgres database -- when you play a recording in
the UI (or download it someday), you're using a signed URL that has temporary
access to just that file. The privacy policy is coming — it’s a good concern
to bring up. We didn’t make this to sell people’s data, and want to be up
front about that.

4\. This is coming, especially for one-off download/export. Depending on the
amount of recordings there might be some work on the user's end. It's
intensive to zip up a bunch of audio and send it to a user, but not
unrealistic. We'd at least have a way for each recording to be downloaded, and
a user could have a script run that downloads all their recordings, in a rate-
limited fashion.

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hieloz
Pretty Good! Could you please add the function to receive text or SMS
messages?

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cjstewart88
Hey there, I'm Cody, one of the cofounders. We definitely want to explore
allowing SMS messages. Not sure when it'll happen, but it's on the radar!

