WhiteyBoard: An Instant Whiteboard For your Instant Office | Hacker News Reader

WhiteyBoard: An Instant Whiteboard For your Instant Office

crunchgear.com

59 pointsjasonwilk55 comments

Created by YC 2010 Alumni as a side project.

Jason-

You've got a few issues here. I'm only buying it because you're on HN, otherwise i'd have run away, but:

- Your paypal integration is busted. I can't complete checkout. - Your billing page seems to still display http - i know you're using an iframed wuform-- but it's not going to cut it. People want to give money. You're not helping them do it.

makes a billion times more sense to give up on the iframe and direct straight to wuforms. If you would rather a more integrated e-comm experience, i suggest shopify or similar.

We seem to be processing checkout fine. I understand your concerns with the http, I thought it would be fine since we are using Wufoo iframe, but I guess that's not cool for the general public. I really appreciate you pointing that out.

If you still can't process or feel uncomfortable, email me your paypal address and I will send you a PayPal request.

My email: jason at tinycomb.com

If you want to use Shopify I can give you half off the sticker price for a fellow HNer.

Thanks Xal. I will get in touch for sure. I wonder how many sales i lost out on today because of the ssl issue. Probably a lot. #fail

Hi xal, can I use Shopify for charging monthly subscriptions for my webapp?

Sorry you can't. It's something people ask us all the time but it's just not the battle we picked ( so to speak ).

I haven't got personal experience with them but I'm hearing good things about chargify.

Hey Xal, I'd like to take you up on that offer. How do I go about getting that deal?

Seems very similar/identical to Magic Whiteboard - http://www.magicwhiteboard.co.uk/ - a UK product that was featured on the UK version of dragon's den - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QvguJJNilA - is Whiteyboard a completely separate company or have Magic Whiteboard not yet got a US patent?

This has nothing to do with them. Have a separate patent in the US.

Not to go off topic or anything but is this kind of an unfortunate name? "Whitey" has pretty negative connotations here in the US anyway.

The co-founder is Australian. I couldn't sway him on the name. I agree, it is questionable and apologies if anyone is offended. Our team is multi-national and they all voted to move forward with the name.

I think it's too funny to be offensive.

that's what I thought too.

The connection never even entered my mind to be honest, and I'd be ahem well acquainted with the term.

Where I come from it means to vomit before passing out due to excessive drug taking.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=whitey

In reality, very few if any black people will probably end up using it anyway. Probably the same relative percentage that frolic around on the beach, go skiing, etc. Black people and white boards -- can't ever think of a time when I've seen that combination.

Folks, I'm half-joking. Obviously, some black people use whiteboards. What struck me was how they're really on the fringes of the core demographic who use them, at best. So the name struck me as funny. And agreed, not the safest choice, but like that saying: no publicity is bad publicity. The only kind of bad publicity is no publicity at all.

WOW... I seriously wonder if you believe this...

Not belief. Observation of actual reality during life experience. It's kinda funny my post got modded down. Means we have as much of a kneejerk P.C. crowd as say a college campus.

I wonder how well the whiteboard would work on a "standard" (North American) textured wall.

In the video, the person (obviously a model) sticks the whiteboard on the door (not the wall). The door is clearly a very smooth surface.

I was thinking exactly the same thing. It is going to be very inconvenient if you feel the texture when writing. All my walls are textured as are the walls in most American offices.

Hey guys, we are going to have version 2 ready soon, which will alleviate any problems with majorly textured walls or brick walls. Currently, this version works on textured walls. It gets the job done. You can follow us on twitter.com/whiteyboards to stay updated. I'll be sure to have the team get on it.

I really like this idea Jason! & you can't really beat that price point (especially compared to the INCREDULOUSLY expensive ideapaint)

But, this reminds me of the $28 DIY 4' x 8' whiteboard?

http://chrismetcalf.net/blog/archives/2007/06/16/how-to-dirt...

Anyone ever tried making their own?

Thanks Jon. I've never tried making one myself. Took us 6 months to make a mass-market version of this to help out startups.

"Showerboard" ghosts excessively and is very hard to clean. I ended up with a big sheet of clear acrylic from "home depot" instead. It was 36" x 72" (3 feet by 6 feet) and cost about $48. It worked perfectly, was easy to hang because its quite rigid and makes a very cool effect when you shine a light on the edges. (The marker marks light up a little).

You can find the stuff in sheets of many sizes by the window and glass repair stuff.

Waxing the showerboard helps. I'd suggest experimenting with different brands of automotive wax to see which one is easiest to clean without resisting the markers. My middle school geometry teacher used waxed showerboard (over 10 years ago) and it worked quite well. Thanks for the idea of using the acrylic. I may have to try that; maybe I can combine it with a FTIR multitouch system or something.

When I click on the play button, a new window opens, but it's blank... Put up some photos maybe?

I'm on FF 3.5.8

How hard/expensive would it be to get a simple pattern printed on this, say, small faint dots forming a 1" grid? I currently use a pair of metal whiteboards with pre-printed grids (glued to a folding table) for my D&D setup. I'd be really interested in using this as a replacement, but I'd rather not have to draw in the grid by hand.

Even better: if I supplied a black and white, vector-graphic image, could I get it faintly printed on one of these sheets?

this will be on version 2. Coming soon. Follow us on Twitter.com/whiteyboards for those updates. DM us for any other requests, I like the feedback from HN.

Offer some preprinted with browser chrome for web developers. I'd buy that. Or underlines (for to-do lists).

How about 'static stickers' (static cling film) with various overlays, browser chrome, iphone template, grids, lines, etc. Can stick to the board wherever you want and write over them as well.

Seems they put the price up $10 because of the techcrunch feature, wonder if that will bite them on the arse.

Would be interesting to see the ghosting / soaking reviews, does it leak into the wall, how hard is it to clean.

That was seriously a mistake. It was never supposed to cost $15. We launched the website last night and had a mix up. If you do a wayback query, you will see the homepage has always said $25.

Okay cool, any chance of UK delivery if I pay shipping (I also work with a UK sticker company if your after a UK distributer)

Follow us on Twitter.com/whiteyboards to stay up on international shipments. We will start accepting them next week sometime.

Where in Los Angeles are you?

I'm actually in San Francisco finishing up Y Combinator for my primary business. The other guys are in Los Angeles near Loyola Marymount University.

My concern would be accidentally wiping some of the pen/texta/marker onto surrounding walls.

What I would like to know is where to buy 3M VHB double-sided stickers. They're much better than the crap 3M and others sell in supermarkets, which can't hold an asthenic gnat.

Judging from the peel-off paper I saved, that's the stuff our local highway-toll radio-pay company uses to hold the transceivers to the windscreen. One nearly needs a crowbar to pry them off the glass.

Anybody using IdeaPaint? --> http://www.ideapaint.com

Rust-Oleum sells a product too. --> http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=128

ideapaint is expensive!

... but worth it. The cheap stuff stinks. Trust me.

IdeaPaint is very expensive. If you don't want to paint and just want something up that is functional, this is perfect.

You can just wax a sheet of the cheap bathroom/shower white wall stuff with hard shell car wax (like turtle wax or something) to make a cheap whiteboard.

Just a note. You are already using gmail so why not sign up for google apps so you can have an email that isn't gmail. It looks a lot more professional and it won't cost you anything as long as you don't have more than I think 3 users on it.

Go to the nearby Lowe's and ask for Tile Board. You get a 4' x 8' for $13-and-change. Just glue it to your wall. I have it at my home (in fact, I got them cut in smaller sizes so my three year old can put one on the floor and draw on it).

Any word on how easy it is to remove? I'm planning on moving in a few months and I wouldn't want to leave it stuck to the wall in my current apartment.

Just bought one. Going to attach it to my draftsman table I picked up at a thrift shop - should make quite a useful work surface...

Jason, are you running a micro retail business and a seed stage growth venture at the same time?

Any advice for someone aspiring to do the same?

How easy is it take off the wall and put back on repeatedly or is this meant for a one time application?

We need one of these!

I know you do Kevin.

I'm not sure why, but the video doesn't load in Chrome.

Hi Json, I'd hope I could buy one here, from China!

can this work as a projector screen you think? can you make it in 10 foot wide?

how are you doing distribution? by hand or is that outsourced?

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