HN: feedback on my image bookmarking website | Hacker News Reader

HN: feedback on my image bookmarking website

imgfave.com

17 pointsgrag26 comments

I built this in about three days using the laconica microblogging platform.

Basic idea is that you grab the bookmarklet (in the "post" section) and then can add images to your account in two clicks from whatever website your on.

Feature wise, the only thing new to image bookmarking here is the friend following feature.. but I'm hoping imgfave can succeed by staying really simple/easy to use and fast.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

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I built this in about three days using the laconica microblogging platform.

Basic idea is that you grab the bookmarklet (in the "post" section) and then can add images to your account in two clicks from whatever website your on.

I'd been looking for a good image bookmarking site to use but they are either invite only (ffffound.com) or too cluttered / too many features (weheartit.com, vi.sualize.us).. so I thought I'd make one myself. Feature wise, the only thing new to image bookmarking this brings is the friend following feature.. but I'm hoping imgfave can succeed by staying really simple/easy to use and fast.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

If the bookmarklet is the heart of getting images bookmarked, it shouldn't be in the "Post" section. It should promoted on every page, especially the home page where it should be accompanied with some instructions.

I agree, I will be adding a box on the homepage that gives new users an idea of what the site is all about and displays the bookmarklet. Thanks for the feedback!

Kudos :)

Basic idea is that you grab the bookmarklet (in the "post" section) and then can add images to your account in two clicks from whatever website your on.

This sentence should be someplace visible on the home page.

At first, I thought the bookmarklet was broken.

I like the way you click on the bookmarklet, then click on the image.

Would be nice to have some sort of indicator after clicking the bookmarklet so the user knows that the images have become hot. Just a discrete little flash message, something like "Okay! Now select your image."

Just drop this in at the top of bookmarklet.js :)

  // Flash message
  var flashMsg = document.createElement("div");
  flashMsg.style.position = "absolute";
  flashMsg.style.right = "0px";
  flashMsg.style.top = "0px";
  flashMsg.style.padding = "20px 40px";
  flashMsg.style.backgroundColor = "#eee";
  flashMsg.style.borderBottom = "1px solid #ccc";
  flashMsg.style.borderLeft = "1px solid #ccc";
  flashMsg.style.fontSize = "30px";
  flashMsg.innerHTML = "<em>Okay!</em> Now select your image";
  document.body.appendChild(flashMsg);

  window.setTimeout(function(){
    flashMsg.style.display = 'none';
  }, 3000);

Thanks, just added that to the bookmarklet!

The bookmarklet does not adapt gracefully when my browser shows only an image. For a quick example, try using the bookmarklet at this address: http://i284.photobucket.com/albums/ll39/inlovewithmoney1/a16... .

I would like it to be a bit more welcoming. Just a little snippet of friendly little intro text like "Welcome dude! Here's what we do, here's where to start!"

I really enjoy the minimalist design.

Minimalist look is such a good choice for this - the images are the focus.

Small bug: signed up, got redirected to my profile and the email address field was blank.

Bookmark is ace. I want to add my own titles, though. And have a back-up upload form in case the bookmark doesn't work.

What are your thoughts on filtering for the front page?

Thanks for the feedback. I may allow users to edit titles once I figure out the best interaction flow for that. As far as filtering goes, right now I probably won't do much, but I may eventually break the home page up into "recently popular" and "new" sections.

the best thing you can do is get provocative pictures and have them appear on sites like reddit to boost traffic.

www.pixdaus.com was on the front page of many digg/reddit sites, and it seems to be doing pretty well, traffic-wise. It's also a very impressive site to visit, becuase some of the pictures are amazing. They have a reddit-style voting system. You might be able to pull images from that site?

I think the term 'fave' is kind of cliche, it doesn't seem to be working for faves.com, but that's probably hard to change at this point.

Comments would be cool, not sure how hard it would be to integrate it with laconi.ca.

Another feature would be to do slideshows of images, or be able to set it as your wallpaper. Or send an e-mail to people with a link to the image. Maybe even make a vista side-bar gadget that pulls images.

A way to cancel adding an image would be nice. Incase you change your mind or something. Maybe click the bookmarklet again or a timeout if you don't select an image after 15-30 seconds, it goes away.

Other then that, I like the design (and after reading the comments here, I could figure out what it did).

That's really funny how it enlarges images no matter how small. http://imgfave.com/index.php?action=shownotice&notice=20...

Also, would it be possible to use Media RSS so that the pictures show up on Friendfeed?

Weird, that shouldn't be happening. I'll fix that today.

I like the minimalist look. However, the bookmarklet shouldn't be confined to the "Post" section. Make it clear that to post images, one needs to use the bookmarklet.

It would be nice if the images either had no title at all, or the user that posted the picture could change the title.

Is it free? If it is, you should explain that as part of your marketing somewhere, at least on the register page. I can see myself wanting to write notes when I bookmark an image, but that might go against your plan, since you think your competitors have too many features.

Yeah, fix this error :)

This page contains the following errors:

error on line 18 at column 732: EntityRef: expecting ';' Below is a rendering of the page up to the first error.

Neat. Can it grab images that are hyperlinked? I'm using Opera, and it doesn't seem to.. don't know if it's a bug or a feature.

I think you have a solid idea, but your implementation is wack. If you can code, why would you use some platform that has absolutely nothing to do with your service? Its just going to create problems down the line. Ex. URLs.

I honestly suggest, you spend about a week implementing this yourself. Its trivial.

samataro: I'm working full time and using laconica was simply the quickest way to get from the idea stage to up and running. If imgfave take off I'll most likely rewrite it from scratch.

Why?

You should be sure that "rewriting from scratch" is going to give your users some concrete benefit that will make them like your site even more, and you should be sure that "rewriting from scratch" is the easiest way to give your users those benefits.

I would understand if this was something big and untested. But IMHO, when a project is as simple as yours is, there is no reason to do it right (not perfect) form the start. There are things you will regret if you start to gain traction.

You need dupe detection.

Yeah, that will be one of the next things I add. Thanks for checking it out!

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