Show HN: HackerCouch
hackercouch.com
hackercouch.com
I've hosted over 40 couchsurfers in Manhattan so I have a few concerns.
My largest one is that HackerCouch lacks a reference system so that people "know" who is a good or bad host or guest. Googling every one who messages me, the host, may not yield as much info as I would like, since most folks aren't 1000-twitter-followers, ten-thousand-github-commits, Forbes-interviewed, rockstars (Like Me![1]). Accordingly, HackerCouch needs some faculty to indicate and ensure the trustworthiness of its listings: perhaps like the kinds founds in Couchsurfing.org, BeWelcome or AirBnb. Otherwise, all hosts ought to have and to link their listings to at least one other platforms so guests can see their pictures, reviews, and other metadata, to make an informed decision to stay with someone who is, essentially, a stranger.
On this note of having to use another platform: I know I would also have to create a staging email address for managing requests. Having received 400+ requests in 4 months, I can safely say that 1% of people will go to... creepy lengths if they feel like they aren't getting the attention they deserve. Clearly showing off all my contact info is fine on my marketing site, but not fine when I'm offering something up for free that people can take free advantage of. AirBnB and Couchsurfing offer a comforting layer of messaging for the host: allowing me to interact cordially with most potential guests without fear of the crazies.
Please note I'm not saying this to discourage you; I would just like this promising idea to avoid the many painful lessons Couchsurfing.org has learned. (... and then ignored.)
[1] This is sarcasm. But if we meet in real life, I'll be sure to scream about it with conviction[2].
[2] This is not sarcasm.
Reference System: I think I saw a website on reddit recently that let you rate your experience on multiple platforms (Can't seem to find it now). But that doesn't work for everyone. For eg, I don't even have a listing on any other platform. Couchsurfing isn't very big here. I'm sure having the entire revision history in git would be of some help if I build a reference system. I'm open to ideas on how to exactly go about this.
Request Management: I could setup some form of email forwarding (How to get your real email over a side-channel might be an issue). Somebody asked me about setting up chat.hackercouch.com for a similar purpose, and I'm open to doing that as well.
On a different note, do you have any suggestions on the trademark issues surrounding Couchsurfing? We have an open PR to replace CouchSurfing with Hospitality Exchange and I'd love to hear your thoughts. [0]
> Reference System
I would suggest piggy backing off another platform for now so that you can get the legwork out of the way and focus on the more unique/cool stuff. Tons of people have multiple listing across AirBnB, Couchsurfing, etc, so I don't see any kind of argument against adding yours into the mix. On your side, this would entail forcing all hosts to link to at least one verified platform and making sure that all their contact info matches what is available in that link. You wouldn't want someone to misrepresent themselves by saying "hey this is my cool place in SF!" and having an email address with a suffix of .co.kp
> Request Management
Same idea as above. Implementing internal messaging is unfun and feature wise would probably not compare to the more established platforms. So, for now, allow hosts to suggest their preferred method of communication[1]. You'll probably won't be able to capture the conversations and, in my mind, that's fine at the starting gate. For now it's all about getting a good liquidity, i.e. guest lookings vs hosts accepting. Regardless of if this is intended to make a profit: guests want lots of open places/people, and hosts don't want to be overwhelmed.
The trick is to make sure your platform has a value-add ( so guests + hosts clearly realize it's helping them!), I'd recommend suggesting to hosts to tell prospective guests to write things like "Yo, I saw your thingamajig on HackerCouch!"[2]
> Couchsurfing trademark issues.
Is there another fun word that conveys what you want out of this platform? It's definitely not worth tangling with Couchsurfing the company.
[1] Chats like slack or IRC are generally not a good medium for requests/pre-hosting conversations, in my opinion. Hosts don't like feeling pressured to respond in the way a chat medium kinda-sorta-implies you should, and requests can tend to be on the longer side. Note: longer messages like emails are pretty always the case for any dialogue with a trust deficit; chats work much better once the two parties have gotten to know each other/don't have to carefully formulate their words.
[2] I have strong feelings about the way requests & references work, in ways that may not be scalable. So I'll try not to push my opinion too hard.
One thing to note is that you actually validate the user owns said account on another site.
On B/S/T forums back in the day, a semi-common "scam" was an impersonating user saying "here's my 1000+ feedback eBay account", which may have the same username but they did not actually own.
As such, I'd ideally like people to communicate over a trusted third-channel. We could provide them a proxy email, I guess to anonymize them somewhat, but seeing as we are already asking for social links, its somewhat moot as your real email should be easily searchable using those social media links.
Makes sense to have HackerCouch being referred on couch requests. I'll add a note and a pre-written subject/body on the contact email link.
I'll look into verifiable platform links and see if I can figure out something. Thanks for your inputs.
Can you comment on how this compares to reality in a place like Manhattan where short-term housing rentals can be pricy?
And also, philosophically why you choose to host couchsurfers vs paid guests?
Surfers have low expectations for accommodation and usually the day is spent chatting and going to places together.
AirBnB is for example couples and people who expect something closer to a hotel and more privacy, they may be busier and prefer to pay for convenience. Say career people who only have a week or two to spend in Japan, so they pay to make things go as smoothly as possible.
I am wary of meeting strangers on the internet. I don't have a Couchsurfing profile, or an airnbnb listing, but I am far more open to fellow hackers.
More on host incentives: http://www.horizonapp.co/blog/incentives-hosting-hospitality...
Whom do I contact to get a spot on one of these WiFi enabled couches? Are they available over the New Year's Eve time frame? Can I bring a bag of Doritos?
What the hell is this?!
My unsolicited advice: Market it to digital nomads exclusively.
I get that it's open sourced, but I don't like that and don't think it makes sense for the nature of the project... I'd prefer someone treating it like a startup and maintaining the product, making a nicer design, growing it, etc.
This is perhaps comparable to private torrent trackers that are invitation only. Though in this case, there wouldn't be a strong incentive to abuse that system. Another example is the invitation-only system with which the OnePlus One launched (and still uses to a degree). The One started off as a "flagship killer" geared toward tech-savvy people, specifically the kind of people who would not buy an iPhone. Like with many "exclusive" products, people became interested. The simple fact that you could have offices at large tech companies with mailing lists with the sole purpose of distributing free invitations is not only excellent advertisement, but it demonstrates how making a product/platform/service exclusive can have substantial benefits when geared toward the right group of people.
I launched HackerCouch at hackbeach this year, and the first few people on there are friends who I know personally, so it was kinda invite-only to start with. But I don't want HC to become the one-stop couchsurfing website for everyone. I want it to be a cool way to find like-minded people where you are travelling.
There is also the issue of privacy. Would you be fine giving your travel information to a central third-party? I would like to keep HC to a minimum listing site and let people take conversations to a side-channel instead.
[0]: http://kernelmag.dailydot.com/issue-sections/features-issue-...
If someone manages to find the site, they're probably there for the right reasons. It might be as little as getting it sidebar'd on r/digitalnomad to get the right crowd on it.
100% agree with having conversations off the platform, I don't think it needs to be dramatically different than what you have now.
Unlock code for the "Hacker News" group on Horizon: hn2015#$
I'm happy to create a private unlock code for Hacker Couch if there is any interest.
*Note most of our effort thus far has been on iOS version -- the web version is still basic (we're currently working on adding a few pieces of functionality). Recently started development on a native android version.