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Comment by fluidcruft | Hacker News Reader

FYI: As both a neuroscientist and a user of desktop mind-mapping software, I can tell you that every time I visit your homepage, I leave laughing. Occasionally I've even called in colleagues for a group chuckle. I assume you don't mean for your site to be a joke. It comes off as even less informed than Psychology Today.

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What a simultaneously mean-spirited and content-free comment. Not appropriate for HN.

It's not content-free and it's not meant to be mean-spirited. I believe honest feedback has value. The story Workflowy is sold with is unintentionally laughable. I could just sit back and continue to laugh at them behind their backs.

It does not mimic the brain's processing of information in ways that are superior to mind-mapping software and if you're going to assert that what's special about your software is that it does something for the first! time! ever!, you'd better be correct. What other information does the landing page/video convey?

That's not to say that Workflowy doesn't have value. I'm saying the value isn't being presented in a way that someone familiar with software in this space is going to believe.

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." T. Roosevelt

Yes, it is possible to romanticize failure... ?

Hi there :) I'm one of the guys who made WorkFlowy. I assume you're referring to the claim at the beginning to the video that WorkFlowy mimics the way your brain naturally works?

If so, I think you're taking that too literally. All we meant was that WorkFlowy is a really easy way to organize your thoughts. When I was making the video, I did wonder if that phrase was a bit too bombastic, so I hear your point. However, we were just trying to create an exciting video, so cut us a little slack :)

Regardless, if you have any thoughts on how we should position it, I'd love to hear them.

I'm referring to the decades of interactive mind-mapping software (which are both much more feature-full and expressive than Workflowy and have already been marketed as being based on how the mind works--and while mind-mapping is also overhyped it well known and has been studied in education and learning). This comparison gets particularly glaring when you assert that your software is the first ever to do this. I think you're doing Workflowy a tremendous disservice by inviting comparisons with mind-mapping software.

Ah, I see. Yeah, the "first" claim is bad, we're going to take it out when we update the video.

I do think you're probably taking the video a little too seriously, though.

When it was released 224 days ago (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1870473), I remember this "mimics your brain" idea but it never bothered me. I did not feel invited to compare it to mind-mapping products. I took Workflowy as a nice dynamic lists software. I like it because of that. It really helps. It was made with the principle that Almost everything you create on Google Docs is a list, so they made Workflowy[1].

I also find mind-mapping studies fascinating. Many times I find myself starting to write in the middle of a sheet of paper and then making connections. I know this is not Workflowy. Can you give some good suggestions on mind-mapping software?

[1] TechCrunch article: http://techcrunch.com/2010/11/04/workflow/

You left out what he should do to make it better.

I don't even get why the hp is funny.

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