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Comment by AJRF | Hacker News Reader

Hey - I'm the author (I self-posted this, I hope that isn't against the posting etiquette here).

I wrote this post after a bit of a failed startup I tried making at the start of lockdown. It was called Ottr and it essentially aped YikYak exactly. I made a react web app, an API with web sockets (it had real time posting and comments) and even an iOS app.

I burnt out on it and gave up because it seems so hard to get that initial traction.

I've been trying to get the project posted publicly on GitHub for a while now but I wrote maybe 10k+ lines with literally zero tests because I was just trying to get it to market. The code isn't bad but i'd feel bad posting it without tests so that's what i'm working through now.

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Don't be afraid to put unfinished code or code without tests up on GitHub -- just mention in your README that it's not production-ready yet or something. It still has educational value for the community. Maybe someone will even help you write tests! Btw, thanks for sharing -- I had never heard of the R-Tree data structure before.

I really should just do this. So there are a few parts (API, App, Web, DB) to it - I wonder what is the best way of representing that? Just have the same readme with links out to the other projects maybe?

Maybe a docker compose file illustrating how everything is connected?

Hey - so I finally got around to this. Details can be found here for getting all the code and running it: https://github.com/afallon02/ottr-deploy-instructions

Don't know if they're still up but I remember there were a bunch of yikyak clones around the time it stopped being popular. Just weren't enough people in any of them, so I stopped them. Network effects and all.

Should have created an open YikYak protocol and merged them all into one herd.

YikYak was for those a little younger than me but I found it really funny to watch and vote and it had the feel of the old internet where no one knew you were a dog.

yikyak failed even with significant funding, why would you ape it exactly?

So I had a bit of a theory (it's stupid I know - you don't need to tell me) that meant that YikYak was to Ottr as Vine was to TikTok - as in;

The idea behind YikYak was so good it was ripe for someone to come along and play of the nostalgia that I (and many of the people I know) for it. YikYak came along when I was in first year of university and it absolutely blew me away with how inventive the idea was. I had so much fun with it, and people were creative and funny on the app.

There is something about it that tickled that tribal part of your brain because it felt like you were part of a big community (but not too big that you feel alone). Seeing a post about your actual friend on the feed from someone anonymous was so engaging.

Lockdown seemed like such an opportune time to release a hyperlocal social network, but I spent so much time tweaking it and trying to make it perfect, but I didn't know how to make people actually use it (I still don't know).

I had Ottr in a working state, but i've made peace that it is solely a learning experience for me, and a fun one at that! (until the burnout of course)

If someone is looking for a YikYak replacement, consider Jodel

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