Ifttt raises $1.5M Seed Round From Top Investors
techcrunch.com
techcrunch.com
(I actually emailed them about this and am awaiting a response).
Needs Access to my entire dropbox account
Requests access to "Gmail" (I have no idea how much access that provides). Why can't it just set the To: Address on an outgoing email? Ifttt has been sending me emails no problem so far. The Gmail permission crosses a line. It doesn't help that Google doesn't explain what access I would grant.
Seems they took the easier path and just defaulted to full permissions. I'm sure enough people don't mind that it was the right decision. Just a personal deal breaker.
Also the Recipe filter needs a quick way to specify "Only my active channels." Or/also, my dashboard reads "8 Channels with 264 possible task combinations. " Why isn't this a link to existing recipes filtered by my active channels?
Ifttt provides no method for deleting your ifttt account or purging your external information.
Need my Dropbox access? Sure, here you go. Need my Gmail access, meh, why not?
I'm not horribly concerned with allowing them the access I've granted to Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Dropbox, and Evernote.
But a "Whoops, we accidentally deleted all your stuff" in dropbox or gmail would be a tad devastating.
The permissions page at Dropbox says:
The app ifttt would like to connect with your Dropbox.
This app will have access to your entire Dropbox.
Please make sure you trust this app before proceeding.
You're currently logged in as user@example.org. If you meant to connect from another account, you can logout.
It also looks like DropBox doesn't have access levels beyond that. If you have access, you can use any of the API, upload / download / delete / etc.
Makes you think about the true intentions behind a startup/company.
That seems reasonable and fair, then again I'm sure he can pull it off well because as far as i know pinboard's a one-man bootstrapped company.
If I had to guess on a business model, maybe adding ads to the notifications?
::GASPPPPPPP::
Price isn't always everything in the consumers mind.
How many people have downloaded Angry Birds vs how many people have paid for Tasker on the Android platform?
A few uses off the top of my head:
- When searching for a new apartment or house and using Craigslist as one of your sources, use Ifttt to get a text/email when a new, relevant Craigslist post appears matching your search criteria
- Automatically add a new Wordpress blog post to Buffer when published
(Off the top of my head, some MailChimp and Eventbrite integration would be nice.)
I bet it's a good feeling when users of other services are banging on the door asking for integration with ifttt.
You could say it's 80% the power/usefulness of Pipes for most users, but 20% the complexity/learning curve.
Some of this is also down to the interaction design and polish too.
I didn't 100% understand what you could do with Pipes based on the first page. I still don't. Is it just for RSS and blogs?
I took one look at the Ifttt page and instantly understood what it could do for me.
Big difference in my eyes.
It seemed a bit weird and was completely unexpected, so I probably wouldn't rely too much on it initially, until you have used it for a while.
From what you're saying, you did it as a service to me, the user, and not to yourselves to save resources, which is what the e-mail notification sounds like - which annoyed me a bit, I have to admit.
I'll give it a second shot and send you an e-mail when or if it happens again. :)
And to Locale above, Tasker actually has support for Locale. The things you can do with those two apps combined is absurdly awesome.
Tasker much less so.
Anyway, glad to see that this service will grow, it's really useful.