We are selling the source code of our startup (time-tracking on IM) | Hacker News Reader

We are selling the source code of our startup (time-tracking on IM)

timmyontime.posterous.com

20 pointsdan_sim22 comments

I find the premise of using IM for time tracking (and hence time management) a flawed idea.

For me, IM is generally a distraction and a timesink, which is why I've opted to uninstall any IM clients and instead do all my interactions through mail, it saves time.

I just don't see how this has any value but I'm willing to be proven wrong.

You mentioned you lost your clients? How? (just curious)

I have also disabled all my IM accounts for the same rasons but I did open one new one where I have only non-human contacts. I use it for receiving alerts from different bots and some tests (My work involves a lot of XMPP stuff).

My point is that IM only becomes a distraction and a timesink when you have human contacts (especially ones with too much free time).

That's the thing though, yours is an edge case. I see the value of utilising IM as a communication method for keeping an eye on things.

However, I think that in the vast majority of cases, people will have people on their IM clients (which is why I said generally) and that is when things go pear shaped quickly.

It just seems like the idea was poorly conceived

Anyway, I don't mean to take too much of a jab at the OP. I have one of those ideas turned into products under my belt that turned out to be a complete wrong fit for what I was trying to achieve.

I think its best to just move on.

We find the premise of using the web for time tracking a flaw. IM is real time communication instead of ad hoc.

The thing is though, I don't think the market sees it like that, otherwise you wouldn't be sitting here trying to sell the source code and instead enjoying your millions of dollars.

I've built something that I thought was brilliant, however when going through user testing it turned out the concept was flawed at its core.

I still think the idea has heaps of potential, but it turns out that unless I am able to fundamentally change the way people behave, that eventually I'll still be wrong.

I'm ok with being wrong, are you?

nobody is going to buy the code from a failed business. why not open-source it?

Why not? Just because the business failed doesn't mean the source is not valuable. As they mentioned this could be a feature someone wants to implement in an existing tool then $25K may be a steal for what they're providing.

I'd want a lot more details though before purchasing.

We already had some people asking for details. If you're interested, just write us to info@azanka.ca .

I don't think you are going to get many takers. In a business, the source code is worth much less than say customers, brand name, etc.

A hobby/project becomes a startup when you have paying customers.

Do you have any?

We did have clients but, to be honest, we lost them. We're not selling their data, it will be available for them to backup but deleted forever after that.

The most valuable thing available here might be the understanding of why/how you lost your clients. Did they sign up and then decide that this methodology just didn't work for them? Or was it something else?

As people are saying, the customers or the business knowledge are the bits here that retain value.

We learned a lot through these 3 years and it has its value. I could talk about it but it's more or less what we see each day on HN. We lost our clients because, like we said in our post, our heart isn't in it anymore.

i, too, am curious how you lost the clients.

also, why the exclusion on using the name? seems like you can get a better price if you sell the whole company. alternatively, if it's worth nothing, why protect it?

We do not protect it, we just want our buyer to have complete freedom and to give us freedom in return. Keeping TimmyOnTime is part of this.

Yeah, code is a liability because it rots pretty fast and requires frequent maintenance. True value is in understanding the customers problem. If your unit tests accurately capture the customers needs then it has value.

The problem is, its a technological stunt, nothing more.

Apparently now, everyone considers things like this startups, in reality, they are just simple technological features, not a business. Not a startup.

You're right... but still, "startup" is a recognized word. When I use the word "our product", nobody upvoted it. When I changed it to "our startup", it was upvoted.

Use the words that your customers understand they say...

if you have questions about it, you can ask it here, I will answer

Don't sell for less than 100k: http://news.ycombinator.org/item?id=1014108

Am I missing something, what does that HN article have to do with $100k? EDIT - never mind, I missed the connection! Good call.

I like the concept of this app, but it seems from their blog that they were having a hard time charging for this service. Without that model in place, like earle mentioned, this isn't really a startup - but for the right person it could be I think.

How did you implement the XMPP part? Just wondered, because I have been toying with writing web-hooks for ejabberd http://happy.cat/blog/XMPP-Bots-ejabberd-mod-motion-2010-02-...

Thanks for your question. We tried ejabber but it was just less friendly than Openfire. We used XMPP4R with Starling for the queue to have a fast interaction between the web and IM. Plus, we used the ORM Rails to access the DB from the listener (the bot), written in pure Ruby.

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