Ask HN: Here is my Minimal Product. Looking to make it Viable. Any suggestions? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Here is my Minimal Product. Looking to make it Viable. Any suggestions?

7 pointsnico_h11 comments

Hi HN

Here is my M(V)P. I am looking for feedback concerning the site, the app and the Java application.

I am getting into marketing it, and while I created the app for myself, I would like to know what market you think would be interested in it :-)

Thank you very much

site: http://www.displayator.com

edit: It is an app for viewing high resolution images on the iPhone. You know, the ones that iTunes downsamples before syncing them on your iDevice. The java app is needed to transform the image in such a way that viewing a 20,000 x 10,000 pixel image on the device does not crash it.

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You just skipped MVP. It's not about the product, but building knowledge on your market and then acting on it. Since you just built it you are at a greater risk of failing :) See the article at http://radoff.com/blog/2010/05/04/minimum-viable-product-ran... to get the irony in your post.

That said, it looks great, and will certainly appeal to photographers and anyone dealing with maps, art scans and the like. You just have to hope the market is actually there and reach them somehow!

I might be wrong, but I think the latest Macs aren't shipping with Java, it could be a problem.

Thanks for the link! Still working on the "somehow". Yeah, the irony is also that I build the Java application on a Mac.

This is a really cool app and I agree that photographers could be a target market.

One thing I've always wanted to see from apps like this: you should be able to push a button that 'pins' the image in virtual space, and when you move the phone, it acts like a window on that image. This can be done using the various movement sensors on the phones.

This is really cool! Feel free to make an Android version!

Thanks :-) Well, if I can sustain myself with this app, maybe I will :-)

clickable : http://www.displayator.com

It's really beautiful. I was surprised by the site. Your remarks made it sound to me like it was slapped together and incomplete. Perhaps you can elaborate on what you feel is needed to make it "viable"?

Best of luck.

Thanks!

Basically, I would really like to know who to market it to. Art students? Photographers? Globe trotters?

I got 3 sales (Italy, Sweden, China) when the price was 10$ at launch time, but as I haven't put analytics into it, I don't know what they do with the app.

I have a certificate in GIS (unfortunately, no related work experience). I was thinking how great it is for maps. You touched on that: Keep a copy of all your favorite transport network maps in your pocket. I think the wording is awkward and should be worked on. And you need to point out how/why this is such a great option for maps. Then target travel sites or some such? Not saying that should be your only market, just hoping it's a place for you to start.

Makes me wish I had the type device this works on. It looks really amazing (to me, but I don't get out much :-/).

Good luck.

PDF kind of already does that. I haven't tried the app though, might have better performance.

Well, it definitely has better performance. Once you've saved your pdf at 300 dpi as a PNG and passed it through the Java app.

If I may say so :-)

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