Bill Gates demos Xobni | Hacker News Reader

Bill Gates demos Xobni

gaborcselle.com

59 pointsgaborcselle32 comments

What's in a name? I just registered the backwards spelling of rotator, kayak, and racecar.

I see what you did there.

Reminds me of a funny video of Weird Al spoofing Bob Dylan by singing only in palindromes:

This is great news for Xobni. Was there an actual crowd, though, at the Office developers conference? (Just curious about the interest of developers to work with MS products - I know I personally wouldn't want to.)

I guess the bottom line now for MS seems to be that they are "desperate" about the future and have a large pile of money to invest - which could be a good thing for developers and acquisition targets.

About 1000 according to this article: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewA...

Anyone from Xobni care to comment on how this came about? Crack PR firm? VC connection? Angel investor who is Linked-in to Mr. Gates?

I've learned that what appear to be serendipitous events usually take a HEAP of backroom planning.

Xobni are one of the chosen startups on the Microsoft accelerator program. Pretty simple. That & a great, usable product which is making the lives of their users much much easier.

I fear the former point is relevant, the latter is not.

Geez I'm getting grouchy in my old age.

Perhaps your judgement with age is the thing which has changed, you haven't even proposed why the latter argument is invalid?

How can you argue that Outlook without Xobni is better than Outlook with Xobni. Outlook is so bad that any minor improvement which changes the user experience of a product which hasn't changed in 10 years is a positive one.

Obviously we aren't talking about the magnitude of the positive change which will increase as xobni improves its product. Surely its existence is sufficient to warrant the acceptance that its a step in the right direction.

I would conjecture you don't even use xobni, or for that matter outlook ;)

I fear I didn't make my point clearly. I didn't mean to malign Xobni at all -- it sounds like an excellent product.

What I was attempting to point out is that the excellence of the product is often unrelated to what gets coverage by bigwigs.

But I am also guilty of not using Outlook on any regular basis.

Actually, it was unrelated to startup accelerator. Just like anything it took a lot of hard work and a little luck. One of the office evangelists became a Xobni user through our in-app invite system. He liked the product. He reached out to us and then we spent a couple weeks putting together screenshots, and answering questions. Every time I talked to him I asked, "so, is it looking like we'll be in the Bill G keynote? How else can I help."

We don't have a PR firm.

Foreshadowing of a buyout?

I'm curious how big the "offer the Xobnis couldn't refuse" would have to be. They're the YC company I think has the biggest commercial potential because it looks like something businesses would pay for. Many (many) other YCs look like M&A targets for bigger companies.

i actually don't see the ability to go independent on this. it's valuable because of the networking functionality it adds to email, but that's only worth money if EVERYONE adopts it.

so what's the best way to push the tipping point? microsoft.

and fwiw, i think loopt was the most commercial YC company but they haven't gained much traction.

I like loopt too but it seems like a network effect type of product, and I don't trust those until they succeed. Didn't realize that Xobni required everyone to use it for it to work - I thought it just mined your email to construct a network relevant to you.

i believe the social aspect of xobni requires a massive network effect to get the best value. the email searches and threaded conversation style emails are great in itself but those aren't worth much more than shareware pricing.

Xobni is valuable in its current state as a powerful standalone email productivity application. Future versions will create more value around networks of Xobni users.

Loopt has a lot of users, actually.

"a lot of users" is relative. How many is a lot for you?

Sadly, here's another possible trajectory - (1) MS "partners" with Xobni; (2) Xobni busts a hump for two more years getting some corporate adoption; (3) MS introduces "MS-obni", an inferior yet similar product; (4) corporate IT departments everywhere dump third-party Xobni for MS version; (5) Xobni dies a bitter and lonely death.

I don't mean to be a downer, but if I was a Xobni guy, this would keep me awake at night.

Large corporations always try to buy you before they try to bake their own. The risk is smaller.

I wouldn't start worrying until I said no to an offer from Microsoft.

Well... There are a lot of third-party software houses that crashed and burned in the '90s and '00s whose stories look exactly like what I outlined. And MS didn't always offer a bag of cash before opening fire.

I think you are blatantly ignoring the entire history of Microsoft.

Yeah, exactly. Although the recent Yahoo temporary insanity might suggest that MS is taking a new approach to competing in the web market.

Do you have any evidence?

Microsoft buys tons of companies, including those competing with internal products. LookOut is a great example, and one that's relevant given the current discussion of Outlook plugins.

Agreed. I would be suspicious of any "partnership" offers from Microsoft. Especially if my product was closely tied to something like Outlook.

Next thing you know MS Office whateverthefuck edition comes out and has the functionality built-in.

now i know why MS didn't manage to compete with Google. They still have their focus on desktop.

Thats ok. It's better for web startups.

Bill Gates used YouTube too before Google buy it, but MS went with creating their own video site..

I just love watching him smile whenever he says Xobni! Woohoo!

Wow, congrats guys!

Coolest news ever.

Great news!

Here's a way Microsoft could begin to redeem itself and be a genuine force for good in the world: start a whole division dedicated to finding truly innovative startups with useful products and buy them. Then have another division that nurtures them.

That would be cool. God knows MS has the cash to do this, and it would inspire (more than ever) people toward innovation.

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