Ask HN: How did everyone do with Launch an App Month?
119 comments
Inspired by patio11 and Bingo Card Creator, I launched Quick Brown Frog:
Still, I plan to keep plugging at it. I have no aesthetic sensibility whatsoever, so next on my list is to get some badly-needed design help.
Many thanks to everyone who provided invaluable feedback during the past month. I really learned a lot and had great fun developing it.
http://www.quickbrownfrog.com
http://quickbrownfrog.wordpress.com
Still, I plan to keep plugging at it. I have no aesthetic sensibility whatsoever, so next on my list is to get some badly-needed design help.
Many thanks to everyone who provided invaluable feedback during the past month. I really learned a lot and had great fun developing it.
I'm going to be negative, sorry.
I think your biggest difference from Patrick is that you are in a B2C situation where he's definitely in a B2B situation.
A teacher or event planner needs to make bingo cards to save time - which is money.
If I just want to type better, I have to justify this expense as a consumer. Is this something I will spend $9.95 on? No. I'll probably spend 20 minutes looking for a free typing tutor that will ultimately have me repeat type what I see on the screen until I get better at typing.
I think your biggest difference from Patrick is that you are in a B2C situation where he's definitely in a B2B situation.
A teacher or event planner needs to make bingo cards to save time - which is money.
If I just want to type better, I have to justify this expense as a consumer. Is this something I will spend $9.95 on? No. I'll probably spend 20 minutes looking for a free typing tutor that will ultimately have me repeat type what I see on the screen until I get better at typing.
Hey, no worries; to each his own. I happily spent $30 (twice!) to buy shrink-wrap typing software.
I think my app outshines the top Google result for "learn to type online". But as you mentioned, not everyone will be willing to pay for that difference.
I think my app outshines the top Google result for "learn to type online". But as you mentioned, not everyone will be willing to pay for that difference.
That is a wonderful application technically. Chat me up sometime when I'm more coherent and I'll give you some marketing/conversion pointers. The only one I trust myself to be accurate on at 2:30 AM is that you need to charge radically more.
Thanks! I'll be in touch.
> free typing tutors out there.
Why tutor? At a glance I thought it was a very cheap way for employers to test via the browser an possible hire's typing speed. A certificate is printed by the person at home who brings that to the employer. It should have a URL that could be used to prove they didn't just make up the result.
Why tutor? At a glance I thought it was a very cheap way for employers to test via the browser an possible hire's typing speed. A certificate is printed by the person at home who brings that to the employer. It should have a URL that could be used to prove they didn't just make up the result.
I won't claim to have answers but I can share some impressions.
The number of clicks you mentioned isn't a lot to judge a PPC campaign on. In such a small sample you never know where the clicks may fall--sometimes you'll get a bunch later and be surprised. I don't mean to suggest you should continue your campaign (especially if you're paying a lot for clicks while lowering your price), just that I wouldn't measure its success based on such a small sample size.
Price drops like that just seem like a race to the bottom, and it doesn't appear you've generated enough traffic to know for sure whether it's necessary. If/when you do find someone who'll pay $9, maybe they would have been just as happy paying $29, or more.
If it does turn out you're "competing with free," there are articles out there discussing tactics you can use to compete. Can you white-label it and sell to businesses, such as temp firms (I assume they still do typing tests)? Or professional training programs?
If that doesn't work, can you give away the tests and sell something else? Use it to generate traffic and promote a broader/different product, etc.?
The number of clicks you mentioned isn't a lot to judge a PPC campaign on. In such a small sample you never know where the clicks may fall--sometimes you'll get a bunch later and be surprised. I don't mean to suggest you should continue your campaign (especially if you're paying a lot for clicks while lowering your price), just that I wouldn't measure its success based on such a small sample size.
Price drops like that just seem like a race to the bottom, and it doesn't appear you've generated enough traffic to know for sure whether it's necessary. If/when you do find someone who'll pay $9, maybe they would have been just as happy paying $29, or more.
If it does turn out you're "competing with free," there are articles out there discussing tactics you can use to compete. Can you white-label it and sell to businesses, such as temp firms (I assume they still do typing tests)? Or professional training programs?
If that doesn't work, can you give away the tests and sell something else? Use it to generate traffic and promote a broader/different product, etc.?
I was thinking the same thing, that 500 clicks was an awfully small sample size, and that I needed to collect more data. But I could go broke trying to get to a meaningful N. :-)
I think this is really well made and only have a few comments on the speed test portion.
I'm not sure if you scale the dial showing your speed, but at 100 words per minute, it's not maxed out, but it is at 123 words per minute (I'm assuming the max is 120 words per minute). I'm assuming so that people can target 60 wpm? I would actually suggest it go either up to 100 or have it go up to where 50% would be the target or average, and maybe scale past that.
Also, for the accuracy on the test, typically it is measured by whether the word was correctly typed after the spacebar is pressed to move to the next word, not a character by character as it's typed (as in, type tou<delete><delete>hough<space> and it's correct). I've always thought it odd that it was done this way, but I naturally correct while I'm typing and that had negative consequences on your test.
That said, you've got something really, really solid here, worth way more than $9.95. It almost lends itself to a subscription model.
I'm not sure if you scale the dial showing your speed, but at 100 words per minute, it's not maxed out, but it is at 123 words per minute (I'm assuming the max is 120 words per minute). I'm assuming so that people can target 60 wpm? I would actually suggest it go either up to 100 or have it go up to where 50% would be the target or average, and maybe scale past that.
Also, for the accuracy on the test, typically it is measured by whether the word was correctly typed after the spacebar is pressed to move to the next word, not a character by character as it's typed (as in, type tou<delete><delete>hough<space> and it's correct). I've always thought it odd that it was done this way, but I naturally correct while I'm typing and that had negative consequences on your test.
That said, you've got something really, really solid here, worth way more than $9.95. It almost lends itself to a subscription model.
The WPM gauge is set to go from 0..120. I didn't expect to have many customers that can type > 100WPM, but perhaps I was mistaken. If anything, I thought that I might end up dialing that down to 0..75, so that most users at the lower-end of the range feel like they're getting a positive result. Maybe I could make that a configurable option in a future release.
As for measuring typing accuracy, that's surprisingly complicated. I wrote up a blog posting on this:
http://quickbrownfrog.wordpress.com/2010/11/22/measuring-typ...
Thanks for the feedback!
As for measuring typing accuracy, that's surprisingly complicated. I wrote up a blog posting on this:
http://quickbrownfrog.wordpress.com/2010/11/22/measuring-typ...
Thanks for the feedback!
I second the subscription idea. Probably you could charge like $5(or more) per month with a minimum commitment of 6 months.
Very nice application. I like the graphing of your progress over time. Maybe you could expand it to include DVORAK? I would have paid far more than $9.95/mo for DVORAK lessons when I was learning it. :)
One thing, though: http://i.imgur.com/rCTzE.png
I type between 130 and 140 WPM. The fastest I could get on your speed test was less than 100 WPM. Maybe some other fast typers can verify that this is a bug?
Good work!
One thing, though: http://i.imgur.com/rCTzE.png
I type between 130 and 140 WPM. The fastest I could get on your speed test was less than 100 WPM. Maybe some other fast typers can verify that this is a bug?
Good work!
98 WPM @ 100% accuracy is probably not my main demographic. :-) It is a known bug though, and on my list to fix, but thanks for taking the time to screen cap it.
What tool have you used previously to measure your rate at 130-140 wpm? QBF counts every 5 characters as a "word"; other apps might measure differently. Did the tool not keep pace with your typing?
Thanks for the feedback!
What tool have you used previously to measure your rate at 130-140 wpm? QBF counts every 5 characters as a "word"; other apps might measure differently. Did the tool not keep pace with your typing?
Thanks for the feedback!
I've used a lot of sites, but I'm most fond of typeracer.com's racing system. Most sites peg me around the 130-140 WPM mark.
Good luck with the site!
Good luck with the site!
How much did you "train" to get to that speed? I moved to dvorak a couple years ago and I'm actually at 80-90wpm. I used atypetrainer4mac to get to 50-60wpm, then I did this http://www.flickr.com/photos/deadsunrise/4338226640/ and I'm up to 85-90 but to get slightly faster now I have to invest too much time.
I'm not sure. I was at 60 WPM at age 16 according to Mavis Beacon and steadily increased over the last decade. IRC was my training program. :)
I do not even type correctly and I have had no formal training. I only use three fingers on each hand (index, middle and ring) and my right pinky finger to press Shift. I actually press the spacebar with my right index finger and occasionally my left thumb.
Sorry that I can't accurately answer your question!
I do not even type correctly and I have had no formal training. I only use three fingers on each hand (index, middle and ring) and my right pinky finger to press Shift. I actually press the spacebar with my right index finger and occasionally my left thumb.
Sorry that I can't accurately answer your question!
I think your "free typing test" might be sort of a marketing vehicle if you could provide embeddable badges of results for blogs, or shortened links to your results for a Twitter stream, FB, etc...
Or maybe not. The sort of people showing off their mad typing skills probably wouldn't also be people who want to buy your service :)
Or maybe not. The sort of people showing off their mad typing skills probably wouldn't also be people who want to buy your service :)
My intended market was the kind of person who googles "learn to type", finds Mavis Beacon, and then orders a CDROM from Amazon. That's what I did a couple of years ago, and it was a painful experience.
First I bought a downloadable version, which then sent me on a wild goose chase for Stuffit Expander, which was required to uncompress the image. Then when I finally got that, it wouldn't run on my OSX Mac.
Finally I learned that there was in fact an up-to-date version available for Mac, but only on CDROM. So then I purchased THAT (yeah, I paid twice!) Ultimately, the software was great, but getting it installed was a major PITA.
I imagine that there are a lot of traditional desktop apps like this that you can only get on CD (or dodgy software downloads). That's the "niche" I'd like to target.
First I bought a downloadable version, which then sent me on a wild goose chase for Stuffit Expander, which was required to uncompress the image. Then when I finally got that, it wouldn't run on my OSX Mac.
Finally I learned that there was in fact an up-to-date version available for Mac, but only on CDROM. So then I purchased THAT (yeah, I paid twice!) Ultimately, the software was great, but getting it installed was a major PITA.
I imagine that there are a lot of traditional desktop apps like this that you can only get on CD (or dodgy software downloads). That's the "niche" I'd like to target.
It would be extra awesome if I could navigate through the lesson via keystrokes.
Hit any key at the end of a lesson, and it will bring you to the next one. I should add tab navigation for "fast forwarding" though...
Well, we did not launch but had two major updates to Kaleidoscope and Versions: http://www.kaleidoscopeapp.com http://www.versionsapp.com
We're especially happy with our changeset feature for git/svn/bzr/hg: http://vimeo.com/17363481 and would love to hear feedback.
We're especially happy with our changeset feature for git/svn/bzr/hg: http://vimeo.com/17363481 and would love to hear feedback.
You work on versions, do you? After using it at my last job, I've found that my work flow completely depends on it. You can tell it was an application designed for the mac, not just by the way it looks, but by the way it works ('Reveal in Finder'? Thank you!). I love how easy it is to see view my changes. I love how easy it is to see that there are changes in the repository, and view what those changes are. I love that you can view the full history of a file, along with who committed each change, the commit note for it, and the diff.
I have to say, though, that if the app was only $10 I probably would have bought it for personal use 9 months ago. As it stands, I'm still struggling with the price, even though I'll probably cave in and buy it after the trial ends on my new computer.
I have to say, though, that if the app was only $10 I probably would have bought it for personal use 9 months ago. As it stands, I'm still struggling with the price, even though I'll probably cave in and buy it after the trial ends on my new computer.
I use Versions and Kaleidoscope all day. They are integral apps to my workflow. Functionally, I think they're awesome. I have two quick questions regarding the UI though:
1. In Versions, the active Timeline/Browse/Transcript button is the one that doesn't look pressed. Why didn't you go with the opposite? http://yfrog.com/fyh6rp
2. What's up with that navy background on the initial Versions screen?
Not big issues, just curious! Keep up the good work.
1. In Versions, the active Timeline/Browse/Transcript button is the one that doesn't look pressed. Why didn't you go with the opposite? http://yfrog.com/fyh6rp
2. What's up with that navy background on the initial Versions screen?
Not big issues, just curious! Keep up the good work.
I launched my first Android app, Fanorona, a traditional board game from Madagascar. So far I've made four sales. At 99¢ each, minus Google's 30%, I've made $2.78. But it was fun. (I also listed it with Archos's AppsLib, but I don't expect to see any money there; they don't pay out until you hit $50.)
http://fanorona.thibault.org/android/
http://fanorona.thibault.org/android/
Getting a Lite version out will probably help you tremendously.
There's really nothing I can take out and still be Fanorona. (Well, maybe Undo, but that'd be insanely frustrating.) Maybe an ad-supported version.
If you have the chops to do multiplayer (either by turns or bluetooth/network-based), you can charge a premium for that.
Play the CPU for free, play your _friends_ for 99 cents.
Play the CPU for free, play your _friends_ for 99 cents.
That would be nice—and, yes, I can certainly do the network programming involved. The app is even built with an MVCish architecture that would let me just drop in the network player.
I think I did really well for the Launch an App Month.
I launched http://sleepyti.me as a "weekend project" at the very beginning of November. It's a simple site designed to help users figure out the best time to go to sleep in order to wake up refreshed.
I have been working steadily on improving the user experience thanks to really helpful feedback that I've gotten from HN and reddit users (thanks!). The site is currently "profitable" from the standpoint that the money I'm scrapping together from ads pays for its share of the (cheapest) Linode plan I have.
I consider Sleepyti.me to be a success (not bad for a guy who doesn't know web design!), and I'm looking forward to building bigger, better and hopefully more monetizable projects in the future.
I launched http://sleepyti.me as a "weekend project" at the very beginning of November. It's a simple site designed to help users figure out the best time to go to sleep in order to wake up refreshed.
I have been working steadily on improving the user experience thanks to really helpful feedback that I've gotten from HN and reddit users (thanks!). The site is currently "profitable" from the standpoint that the money I'm scrapping together from ads pays for its share of the (cheapest) Linode plan I have.
I consider Sleepyti.me to be a success (not bad for a guy who doesn't know web design!), and I'm looking forward to building bigger, better and hopefully more monetizable projects in the future.
Appointment Reminder launches "for real" on Monday. (A cold cost me a few days from the planned schedule.)
Congrats! And will you be doing a final wrap up blog post about the process? If so, I am looking forward to it.
Sure. Anything you want me to cover in particular?
I'm also in talks with Twilio about producing something with them about it. Preview of coming attractions: everybody should use Twilio. Oh goodness. It is freaking amazing. It is like email: add it to an application, just about any application, and it gets suddenly, radically better. (And the existence of it makes possible applications that wouldn't be possible otherwise, like AR.)
I'm also in talks with Twilio about producing something with them about it. Preview of coming attractions: everybody should use Twilio. Oh goodness. It is freaking amazing. It is like email: add it to an application, just about any application, and it gets suddenly, radically better. (And the existence of it makes possible applications that wouldn't be possible otherwise, like AR.)
I've played around with Twilio and I'll second this statement 100%.
Now I just need to think of something to make that can take full advantage of their capabilities.
Now I just need to think of something to make that can take full advantage of their capabilities.
Nothing in particular, I just really enjoyed the first two you wrote. Seeing the entire process of launching a product laid out was very interesting. Thanks!
I put up a MVP at bzzard.com a couple days ago. The problem that I was trying to solve is that I have a bunch of small websites, and I wanted to see all my sites stats on one page. So, I’m just scratching my own itch.
The site is pretty simple to use. Think twitter for your app. Just send a message containing 140 char message, a double, latitude, and longitude. Then login to create a dashboard where you can display gauges, charts, and message streams. You can filter on the message and the double value that was posted. You can also create counts, sums, and averages in the charts and gauges. There’s a messaging system that allows you can set up status logic to send of messages if certain conditions are met. The dashboard and messaging evaluates metrics, updates dashboards, and sends out messages pretty close to real time, 20-30 seconds.
The site is up and running. You can check it out by going to bzzard.com and logging in as [email protected] and password of jerry. I have page view and application restart messages from bzzard.com displayed. It’s still a bit buggy, and it is sitting on the cheapest godaddy server. But, I’m still pretty surprised at what I was able to accomplish in such a short amount of time.
The site is pretty simple to use. Think twitter for your app. Just send a message containing 140 char message, a double, latitude, and longitude. Then login to create a dashboard where you can display gauges, charts, and message streams. You can filter on the message and the double value that was posted. You can also create counts, sums, and averages in the charts and gauges. There’s a messaging system that allows you can set up status logic to send of messages if certain conditions are met. The dashboard and messaging evaluates metrics, updates dashboards, and sends out messages pretty close to real time, 20-30 seconds.
The site is up and running. You can check it out by going to bzzard.com and logging in as [email protected] and password of jerry. I have page view and application restart messages from bzzard.com displayed. It’s still a bit buggy, and it is sitting on the cheapest godaddy server. But, I’m still pretty surprised at what I was able to accomplish in such a short amount of time.
I launched http://www.hackerlunch.com
It basically lets you meetup with other hackers. You post lunch plans and let others join in.
Its very buggy (I am not a coder, and I don't think I'll manage to become one) and at this point has a rather ugly interface (ironically I'm a web designer). I worked on this for two days and released it, which is a big deal for me since this is the first time I actually launched something.
I haven't received much feedback from the HN community, which is a bit discouraging, but I plan to keep working on this.
In the immediate next release, I will make it a bit more stable and improve the interface (new design: http://i.imgur.com/KOaA8.jpg). And after that, if I get any positive feedback, I'll add features like adding more personal (links to you social network profiles), filter by location, etc.
If anyone has any feedback on the site, the current version or the future plans, please share.
It basically lets you meetup with other hackers. You post lunch plans and let others join in.
Its very buggy (I am not a coder, and I don't think I'll manage to become one) and at this point has a rather ugly interface (ironically I'm a web designer). I worked on this for two days and released it, which is a big deal for me since this is the first time I actually launched something.
I haven't received much feedback from the HN community, which is a bit discouraging, but I plan to keep working on this.
In the immediate next release, I will make it a bit more stable and improve the interface (new design: http://i.imgur.com/KOaA8.jpg). And after that, if I get any positive feedback, I'll add features like adding more personal (links to you social network profiles), filter by location, etc.
If anyone has any feedback on the site, the current version or the future plans, please share.
I'd really like the filter by location feature. I think not having that is really holding you back. Good luck.
For everyone who has launched, have a look at this site:
http://www.44tips.com/b/Eric/Where_to_submit_your_Startup/
I put together Markup Converter http://markupconverter.com/
It's a simple web service for converting markup from one format to another. Most of the conversions in the app are done using the Haskell library Pandoc, but I'm also using Discount, Python's Docutils and Ruby's RedCloth. It was also an opportunity to use MongoDB a little more. Right now it just converts snippets to snippets, but I'm in the process of adding additional options, like autolinking URLs when outputting HTML and adding headers and footers for formats like RTF that require them for complete documents.
I really liked the November sprint idea and am going to try to launch at least one thing a month this winter, even if only a simple microapp.
It's a simple web service for converting markup from one format to another. Most of the conversions in the app are done using the Haskell library Pandoc, but I'm also using Discount, Python's Docutils and Ruby's RedCloth. It was also an opportunity to use MongoDB a little more. Right now it just converts snippets to snippets, but I'm in the process of adding additional options, like autolinking URLs when outputting HTML and adding headers and footers for formats like RTF that require them for complete documents.
I really liked the November sprint idea and am going to try to launch at least one thing a month this winter, even if only a simple microapp.
Well it was about a year in the making, but we finally launched our product to the public:
http://www.gethifi.com
Getting it out the doors is a great feeling!
http://www.gethifi.com
Getting it out the doors is a great feeling!
Congrats Joel - looks like it's come a long way since I first took a look when you guys told me about it last year.
I launched my MVP, Photosherpa. If you take too many photos and don't have time to go through them, you'd like it. You send all your photos to it, you get back only the good ones (so you can put them online right away).
http://www.photosherpa.com
This really looks like something I could use. I'll give it a try!
It is amusing with our app, we launched 'Can I afford it now?' http://caniafforditnow.com and when we showed it to friends, everyone got excited and started telling us how we could monetize it and how they might use it but they never actually went and used it.
We think it has potential and it is just a matter of finding motivated users and will push in that direction but we shall see....
If you have ideas, please share or email me
We think it has potential and it is just a matter of finding motivated users and will push in that direction but we shall see....
If you have ideas, please share or email me
The main problem I see is that filling in information sucks, and you have to fill in a lot of information to get an answer. The other problem is that people who bother to keep track of all that information probably already use something like Mint. Mint already has a Goals feature that let's you do something similar, and they already have all your data.
To get around this problem you could make a bunch of assumptions and just present people with some good financial tips in the form of questions.
For example, let's say the person says they want to buy a $10000 car.
Your app would respond:
Are you paying in cash? If so,
- Do you have enough saved up for an emergency? You should have at least 6 times your monthly expenses saved for emergencies.
Are you going to make monthly payments? A 3 year loan for $10,000 at 6% interest will cost you about $300 per month.
- A car should cost no more than 1/3 of your annual income, do you make at least $30000?
- Your monthly expenses shouldn't exceed your income, do you make at least an extra $300 per month?
- Some of your monthly income should go towards retirement. Are you saving at least 6% per month?
Etc.
Then you could offer people the option of putting in their information to make the feedback more accurate and personalized.
To get around this problem you could make a bunch of assumptions and just present people with some good financial tips in the form of questions.
For example, let's say the person says they want to buy a $10000 car.
Your app would respond:
Are you paying in cash? If so,
- Do you have enough saved up for an emergency? You should have at least 6 times your monthly expenses saved for emergencies.
Are you going to make monthly payments? A 3 year loan for $10,000 at 6% interest will cost you about $300 per month.
- A car should cost no more than 1/3 of your annual income, do you make at least $30000?
- Your monthly expenses shouldn't exceed your income, do you make at least an extra $300 per month?
- Some of your monthly income should go towards retirement. Are you saving at least 6% per month?
Etc.
Then you could offer people the option of putting in their information to make the feedback more accurate and personalized.
I was planning to launch http://getbizen.com in November. In some ways it is a success. The site it up, I can accept new customers, there is a product (a BI dashboard for franchisees).
However, I got a little sidetracked because I had fundraising opportunities pop up. I ended up spending more time in the last two weeks of November talking to investors than I did talking to customers. I don't know that I should say that I was "sidetracked" because I am responding to investor inquiries, not seeking out potential investors.
My goal was to launch the app and have a paying customer. Instead the app is ready for customers, and I have customer interest, but I did not meet that goal. I was using the HN November push as a way to try and accelerate the execution of a business I had already started working on (in September).
I am not going to claim success in Launch an App Month, but it was great for me and I have been killing it all month. Now I am going to do "Close the funding December" so that I can get back to building the business. I am really excited by this opportunity.
However, I got a little sidetracked because I had fundraising opportunities pop up. I ended up spending more time in the last two weeks of November talking to investors than I did talking to customers. I don't know that I should say that I was "sidetracked" because I am responding to investor inquiries, not seeking out potential investors.
My goal was to launch the app and have a paying customer. Instead the app is ready for customers, and I have customer interest, but I did not meet that goal. I was using the HN November push as a way to try and accelerate the execution of a business I had already started working on (in September).
I am not going to claim success in Launch an App Month, but it was great for me and I have been killing it all month. Now I am going to do "Close the funding December" so that I can get back to building the business. I am really excited by this opportunity.
I am still working on mine. It'll take a few more weeks before the MVP ready to be launched. I have my landing page up at http://www.serverfabu.com/
The inspiration for this project came from the feedback I've received for my ASK HN http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1815344
The inspiration for this project came from the feedback I've received for my ASK HN http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1815344
Just signed up for your contact list. I'm itching to move off of Google App Engine, but not looking forward to jumping back into the sysadmin game, which is what I'd need to do in order to move to AWS or Rackspace or whatever.
I have no idea what your pricing will be like (and I'm guessing that you don't either, at this stage), but it would be great if you had something for micro-ISV type shops (read as: cheap).
As a solo dev, I'd love it if there were a service that would set me up with a linux image on AWS, nicely configured for MySQL/Postgres, JBoss/Tomcat, SSL cert, firewall rules, etc. If I could pay you a one-time fee for that, and then be off and running it would be very attractive.
I have no idea what your pricing will be like (and I'm guessing that you don't either, at this stage), but it would be great if you had something for micro-ISV type shops (read as: cheap).
As a solo dev, I'd love it if there were a service that would set me up with a linux image on AWS, nicely configured for MySQL/Postgres, JBoss/Tomcat, SSL cert, firewall rules, etc. If I could pay you a one-time fee for that, and then be off and running it would be very attractive.
As of now, this is what exactly I am planning, One-time fee for setting up the server, hardening for security, installing/configuring software etc. I think the price should have a bearing on the complexity of the setup.
Well!
Made and shipped Pepbot.
http://pepbot.com
I rolled out a series of huge updates for my site:
- released a JavaScript version of the API
- released an ActionScript 2 version of the API (AS2 is an antique I wasn't going to bother with but one of my users back-ported my API for me so I took it from there)
- added custom data for leaderboard scores, can't wait to see what my users do with that
- added some awesome new reports to help developers make their games more engaging and generally ease them into data-driven development, a lot of casual game developers "launch and forget" which is something I'd like to see phased out
- launched the level sharing API for user-created levels
- announced pricing, still haven't implemented it yet but that's coming ASAP
And I made the whole thing real time ... 8 billion events a month and growing!
- released a JavaScript version of the API
- released an ActionScript 2 version of the API (AS2 is an antique I wasn't going to bother with but one of my users back-ported my API for me so I took it from there)
- added custom data for leaderboard scores, can't wait to see what my users do with that
- added some awesome new reports to help developers make their games more engaging and generally ease them into data-driven development, a lot of casual game developers "launch and forget" which is something I'd like to see phased out
- launched the level sharing API for user-created levels
- announced pricing, still haven't implemented it yet but that's coming ASAP
And I made the whole thing real time ... 8 billion events a month and growing!
launched it. i'm not super comfortable sharing it just yet with the HN crowd just yet because (1) its starting to reach the upper limits of the tiny slice i'm running it on and i'd like to save those resources for users, and (2) its super niche and i only know of 3 HN users who would maybe ever use it.
its basically a statistics gathering/analytics app for a sport. 24 hours and about 150 registered users. it currently only has a free version and i'm working on new features for a paid version.
i'm stuck on pricing, though. not sure how much people will be willing to bite on any paid version of what i'm offering, even if i added some super awesome features.
i use it, though, and thats what counts.
its basically a statistics gathering/analytics app for a sport. 24 hours and about 150 registered users. it currently only has a free version and i'm working on new features for a paid version.
i'm stuck on pricing, though. not sure how much people will be willing to bite on any paid version of what i'm offering, even if i added some super awesome features.
i use it, though, and thats what counts.
I didn't do so great. My MVP works, but it needs more effort before it's ready for Beta (as a lot will change between now and Beta, but it's about a day or two's work). Minklinks actually works well and makes sharing links a one-click job.
In the end my day job got in the way, and while I was up for spending evenings and weekends on it my wife had arranged something on nearly every weekend that I couldn't back out of.
I have a large block of time booked off in December, a lot of which I'll be using on Minklinks so it's likely to be a 'launch december' app now. You can still sign up for the Beta at http://www.minklinks.com/.
In the end my day job got in the way, and while I was up for spending evenings and weekends on it my wife had arranged something on nearly every weekend that I couldn't back out of.
I have a large block of time booked off in December, a lot of which I'll be using on Minklinks so it's likely to be a 'launch december' app now. You can still sign up for the Beta at http://www.minklinks.com/.
I launched the beta of my app in mid-November, although I must admit I did start mid-October so I'm hoping I still qualify!
I decided to build a revenue generating URL shortener. This was one of the first full projects where I basically did everything myself - research, design, development etc, which was a bit frustrating a times. It's ridiculous how unproductive my design days were compared to my development days, but I guess I'm just going against the grain there (I'd be interested to know how many people have 'mastered' both design & development.) That said, I learned quite a lot about the whole process, so definitely a good result.
I decided to launch before a lot of the esential functionality was complete (conversions, payments etc) just to get a feel for what people wanted, and most importantly if it was worth persuing the idea further. I'd probably do the same again next time, although I must admit I felt a bit helpless in the first week of launch when bugs were being uncovered/features were being requested and I was still working on the core.
I'm now onto marketing my app with my business partner. The market we're trying to is obviously insanely saturated, so it's a little frustrating at times, but I'm super motivated to get this out so lets hope we get some traction sometime soon :)
The URL of the app is http://shrtn.co
I decided to build a revenue generating URL shortener. This was one of the first full projects where I basically did everything myself - research, design, development etc, which was a bit frustrating a times. It's ridiculous how unproductive my design days were compared to my development days, but I guess I'm just going against the grain there (I'd be interested to know how many people have 'mastered' both design & development.) That said, I learned quite a lot about the whole process, so definitely a good result.
I decided to launch before a lot of the esential functionality was complete (conversions, payments etc) just to get a feel for what people wanted, and most importantly if it was worth persuing the idea further. I'd probably do the same again next time, although I must admit I felt a bit helpless in the first week of launch when bugs were being uncovered/features were being requested and I was still working on the core.
I'm now onto marketing my app with my business partner. The market we're trying to is obviously insanely saturated, so it's a little frustrating at times, but I'm super motivated to get this out so lets hope we get some traction sometime soon :)
The URL of the app is http://shrtn.co
I managed to amalgamate some similar projects into http://feedladder.com and move it from activerecord to mongomapper. Basically it allows for twitter feeds to have their own submission and voting for their tweets. Best example right now is probably http://profquotes.feedladder.com.
Haven't gotten around to making workflow to add new ones automatically though, school and work take a toll.
Haven't gotten around to making workflow to add new ones automatically though, school and work take a toll.
I got http://wantmyjob.com in passable shape, and realized some new things I should really have done with it. It's a peer-to-peer job search site -- asks questions about your jobs, recommends other people's jobs to you based on what you say you like.
I'm making those upgrades in December, which some of us are continuing into :-)
Right now you have to make an account to have a look (that's one of the things I'm fixing in December), but it's pretty neat.
I'm making those upgrades in December, which some of us are continuing into :-)
Right now you have to make an account to have a look (that's one of the things I'm fixing in December), but it's pretty neat.
I submitted stk8.co few days ago but it barely got the attention.
stk8.co allows you to stack several Links or Text and share them under one shortened url.
It embeds a preview of the link for common services like youtube, vimeo, amazon, cnn, scribd, etc...
Here are couple of examples:
http://stk8.co/gkbbbc
http://stk8.co/sample
It also has a bookmarklet for easy stacking. The bookmarklet is transparent, one click is all what it takes to stack a link.
stk8.co allows you to stack several Links or Text and share them under one shortened url.
It embeds a preview of the link for common services like youtube, vimeo, amazon, cnn, scribd, etc...
Here are couple of examples:
http://stk8.co/gkbbbc
http://stk8.co/sample
It also has a bookmarklet for easy stacking. The bookmarklet is transparent, one click is all what it takes to stack a link.
I like this a lot! Thanks for putting it out there! The whitespace around the pages bugs me a bit, but I'm not sure what would be better in its place.
I badly wanted something like this and almost got started building one. Glad someone did it, and looks awesome. Congrats!
A great demo would be a bunch of links from Launch an App Month :)
Thanks for the feedback! :)
Terrible, although I am smack in the middle of selling my house and moving from the east coast to the west coast, so perhaps this wasn't a great time to try to build and launch an app.
I really like the idea of setting a deadline to launch an app though. November wasn't really a workable time period for me personally, but it would definitely be helpful for me to set a deadline and possibly make it public so it would force me to really get something done.
I really like the idea of setting a deadline to launch an app though. November wasn't really a workable time period for me personally, but it would definitely be helpful for me to set a deadline and possibly make it public so it would force me to really get something done.
Same here. Except that I bought a house.
Even my similar submission to HN about the status of the apps launched didn't go so well (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1955031) :)
But, as I said there, I'll keep working on this.
Even my similar submission to HN about the status of the apps launched didn't go so well (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1955031) :)
But, as I said there, I'll keep working on this.
I launched http://bettermeans.com
Over a year of coding though, so it was luck that it launched in November
I launched http://imendi.com
It is basically some web app to learn other languages (Spanish, Portuguese and Czech right now, few will follow soon). Principle is very simple: you assign foreign words to its english equivalent.
I build this because I am learning Portuguese right now and it is hard to learn grammar without knowledge of basic words. There are around 300 most common words in the app right now.
It is basically some web app to learn other languages (Spanish, Portuguese and Czech right now, few will follow soon). Principle is very simple: you assign foreign words to its english equivalent.
I build this because I am learning Portuguese right now and it is hard to learn grammar without knowledge of basic words. There are around 300 most common words in the app right now.
I launched fake iphone text - http://www.fakeiphonetext.com/
We launched everyAir late Oct, but started really getting users this month after some updates. It is a fast remote desktop app for iOS designed for games and movies. Check it out everyair.net
Getting encouraging feedback from users. We are now heads down working on the next version due in a few days.
Would love HN feedback, email for free coupon.
Getting encouraging feedback from users. We are now heads down working on the next version due in a few days.
Would love HN feedback, email for free coupon.
I launched one. See all of the groupon deals in your town and others in one simple interface: http://www.groupongroupie.com/
I'm still working on a few kinks in the daily email list.
The daily inspirational emails from 21times really helped.
Ha! Since I 'discovered' this I've used it nearly daily in preparation for Christmas travels as well as gift shopping for friends around the country. I had a suspicion that you were a HN-er.
Whoah - a user. I've heard about you, but didn't know you existed.
Thanks for trying it out!
(and tell your friends).
Very early stage launched a site called WannaDo with my buddy davidfraga.
It is an easy way to remember the things that you hear about on the go so you can check them out later (Books, Movies, Restaurants, etc). You send an email to [email protected] and it'll be sorted and stored for later. Lists are public by default so it can be used as a way to check out the things that your friends are interested in doing (working on proper user accounts so that there is a way to keep things private/actually discover your friends).
You can try it out at http://wanna.do or by sending an email to [email protected] with the list name you'd like to create in the subject line and the item you'd like to add to that list in the body of your email. We'll set up an account for you automoatically a-la-Posterous.
It is an easy way to remember the things that you hear about on the go so you can check them out later (Books, Movies, Restaurants, etc). You send an email to [email protected] and it'll be sorted and stored for later. Lists are public by default so it can be used as a way to check out the things that your friends are interested in doing (working on proper user accounts so that there is a way to keep things private/actually discover your friends).
You can try it out at http://wanna.do or by sending an email to [email protected] with the list name you'd like to create in the subject line and the item you'd like to add to that list in the body of your email. We'll set up an account for you automoatically a-la-Posterous.
While I didn't actually launch anything, I did make a lot of progress on two separate apps:
One to facilitate collaborative tabletop games (think Settlers of Cataan or Dungeons & Dragons) between remote parties. Built with node.js, redis, jquery, html5, css3, buzzwords.
Another smaller, quicker app that spun off the first was a web interface for the OS X `say` command. Sometimes I'm on ubuntu or windows and I wish I had access to make a mac actually speak a sentence. Built using the same stack, same tools, just much smaller in scope.
I only pivoted late in the month, the day after thanksgiving, so I'm hoping to launch that after I tidy up the UI and come up with a name. Anyone have any suggestions?
One to facilitate collaborative tabletop games (think Settlers of Cataan or Dungeons & Dragons) between remote parties. Built with node.js, redis, jquery, html5, css3, buzzwords.
Another smaller, quicker app that spun off the first was a web interface for the OS X `say` command. Sometimes I'm on ubuntu or windows and I wish I had access to make a mac actually speak a sentence. Built using the same stack, same tools, just much smaller in scope.
I only pivoted late in the month, the day after thanksgiving, so I'm hoping to launch that after I tidy up the UI and come up with a name. Anyone have any suggestions?
I would love to hear more about the app that you started for games like Settlers of Catan. I love Settlers and I have thought about doing something similar for a while.
Do you have a link to source or a blog post about it or anything? Could you talk more about what you tried to build?
Do you have a link to source or a blog post about it or anything? Could you talk more about what you tried to build?
I launched the beta of http://babble.ly
A Twilio powered free disposable link generator for phone numbers. The goal is to enable users to be contacted by phone on the internet, quickly, easily and privately.
I'd love feedback!
A Twilio powered free disposable link generator for phone numbers. The goal is to enable users to be contacted by phone on the internet, quickly, easily and privately.
I'd love feedback!
Well the facebook group is very verbose about that :
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_141079939271952...
It's now a monthly launch pad group
It's now a monthly launch pad group
We lauched videolla.com in the beginning of month, so most of the month was spend on customer development, support and iterating product. We have some exciting results so far, paying customers, traffic is growing, partnerships, requests for features, etc. So things are going great so far.
BTW we are working on some kicking ass API to allow developers use premium licensed content in your apps, sites, games. So thing you can make your Guitar Hero with Lady GaGa music or something like watch Netflix movies with friends and Facetime. How cool is that, huh? Signup on our site if you want to stay in touch :)
BTW we are working on some kicking ass API to allow developers use premium licensed content in your apps, sites, games. So thing you can make your Guitar Hero with Lady GaGa music or something like watch Netflix movies with friends and Facetime. How cool is that, huh? Signup on our site if you want to stay in touch :)
Launched an iPhone app for young ones to learn alphabet by popping balloons :)
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/popn-learn-abc/id400222528?mt...
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/popn-learn-abc/id400222528?mt...
I saw you post this on the Business of Software forum...
I purchased this game when you posted there and now it's my 2 year old's favorite game!!!
We absolutely love it, good job.
I purchased this game when you posted there and now it's my 2 year old's favorite game!!!
We absolutely love it, good job.
I created "Airy Canary Free" for iPhone and iPod touch: http://www.fizzbuzzgames.com. It went live in the app store on Nov 29th I believe.
http://wavylab.com < chinese version of pandora. it only plays chinese songs.
stats: ~350GB songs streamed in 64KB bitrate. ~13048 hours of songs played.
New UI is pending.
stats: ~350GB songs streamed in 64KB bitrate. ~13048 hours of songs played.
New UI is pending.
Made an app to upload and play your music library online through the browser. Not only that, but enabled one click library sharing between friends with an access link.
for example: http://ymitrimusic.appspot.com/share/5ef46
You can login with your google account. The front end is based on the open source sound cloud player, and i've left some of the soundcloud functionality in for streaming.
for example: http://ymitrimusic.appspot.com/share/5ef46
You can login with your google account. The front end is based on the open source sound cloud player, and i've left some of the soundcloud functionality in for streaming.
Not sure if it counts since we have been in our beta for a while so it's not exactly an MVP, but we finally launched Mockingbird 1.0 in November (http://blog.gomockingbird.com/10-and-real-time-collaboration). I had been working on the real-time collaboration stuff for a while - felt good to finally get it out in front of users.
Well... I released a dud - SMSuL8r.com - sms reminders.
Then I built http://castmyclips.com, which is not quite ready for prime time, but is usable. It allows you to take text (copied from web sites) and turn it into audio. then you can listen to the audio & even subscribe to it in iTunes. It was quite fun to build, and I'm actually kind of proud of it.
Then I built http://castmyclips.com, which is not quite ready for prime time, but is usable. It allows you to take text (copied from web sites) and turn it into audio. then you can listen to the audio & even subscribe to it in iTunes. It was quite fun to build, and I'm actually kind of proud of it.
I'm so close! I should have something up by next week. Got a ton done, though. You know, that whole last 90% thing. I'm totally pumped, though.
Was one long night away from launching www.rankoro.us on the 30th when the power chord for my laptop died. Ordered a new one but we're in the middle of a snow storm in Dublin so it's delayed. With a bit of luck, break in the weather and a solid nights work i should be up in the next few days.
Sprint was a great idea and the last two weeks were my most productive in yesrs.
Sprint was a great idea and the last two weeks were my most productive in yesrs.
Based on the idea of justbuythisone.com > I did a North American version http://b.estprice.com as a proof of concept.
Sample page: http://b.estprice.com/laptop/under-1000
Sample page: http://b.estprice.com/laptop/under-1000
Like many others, I didn't hit the launch date for my app: seating plan software for dinner events and weddings (http://www.tabletwist.com). I did make huge amount of progress though, and I'm hoping to launch before 2011!
I didn't launch but I made huge progress to my webgame
Looking for advice and suggestions to the alpha release version:
http://four2go.gumyum.com
Feel free to login as foxhop, no authentication needed, and try it out with a buddy.
Uses ajax long polling to update the games.
Looking for advice and suggestions to the alpha release version:
http://four2go.gumyum.com
Feel free to login as foxhop, no authentication needed, and try it out with a buddy.
Uses ajax long polling to update the games.
I did alright, I got the technology built and am working on getting customers to use me as the UI.
http://blog.mathgladiator.com/2010/11/customer-1-without-lau...
http://blog.mathgladiator.com/2010/11/customer-1-without-lau...
Launched CoderStack:
http://www.coderstack.co.uk/
http://www.coderstack.co.uk/
Didn't launch a new app but did get a major version update out the door (in addition to fixes for everything iOS 4.2 broke): http://ipadportfolioapp.com/
I'm probably late to the party in this thread. I've launched mine couple days ago, http://www.previouslook.com (web page snapshots overtime).
Started working on mine webapp, but unfortunately other things came in the middle so I'm about 5% finished :\ I'm planning on completing it someday as we need it internally anyway. So maybe some day.
We're hoping to launch the new version of our comic creation website http://chogger.com before the holiday break. Lots to do in the next 3 weeks!
I launched http://www.agentshowroom.com/ with some help from phoenix24 I found on OfferHN who parsed a PSD to html/css for me.
I got to a working prototype on my phone.. now all that's left is getting an app icon, splash screen, adding some graphics to the UI. But the app itself already works
I released http://www.searchforphp.com/ and im looking to roll out python java and dotnet versions soon.
I launched CaptionMash, definitely need some usability / UX feedback though. http://www.captionmash.com
I made http://7courses.com - An online recipe manager that allows you to organize your recipes your way.
Didn't launch, But the idea is well under development.
It was a month long project, but with life and a gf sometimes its hard to get things done.
It will get done.
It will get done.
Working on a game called Santa Strike. Should have a prototype for HN in the next day or two. Remember Elf Bowling? It's a bit of a tribute :)
Almost, almost ready. Just putting on the final touches and planning on launching in 2 weeks.
Just to follow up: I didn't get close to being done. Looking back, November was an awful month for me to plan on releasing something. Between the two kids and everything they had, a week long vacation, and some big projects at work, not to mention commitments in other areas, I just failed to make the time.
I'm not disappointed... much. However, I did get some important stuff done, and after the holidays (which involves another big trip), I'll have some time where I'm not going for weeks at a time that I can put together an app.
I'm not disappointed... much. However, I did get some important stuff done, and after the holidays (which involves another big trip), I'll have some time where I'm not going for weeks at a time that I can put together an app.
http://contexium.com -- Call analytics and mining.
In customer acquisition mode now.
In customer acquisition mode now.
I didn't reach my goal, but that's because I'm taking a break from most side projects to finish my grad school application, which unfortunately takes precedence due to hard deadlines. :/
Well, it's December 2, so I figure it's time for some show and tell.
How did everyone do?