Down To Fax is Chatroulette for fax machines | Hacker News Reader

Down To Fax is Chatroulette for fax machines

downtofax.com

84 pointsarram33 comments

  Q) How will you make money?
  A) Volume.

Funny people.

(The random profiles are hilarious too: http://www.downtofax.com/random)

You might want to link to the non-HTTPS version, or fix the certificate.

Very cool and funny, though.

Chrome wouldn't let me get through to your site through your link because of certificate issues but it works fine over an insecure connection; for the lazy here's the non-HTTPS link: http://www.downtofax.com/

Definitely an interesting/hilarious idea (and I love your testimonials section), but I have to ask, has anyone actually given you a fax number yet? I don't think I know a single person that still owns a fax machine

Creating fake profiles of customers using picture of dead people is not funny at all. http://www.downtofax.com/users/8c51050c7abd11e1b11512313d186... http://www.elizabethstricklandunterzuber.com/ She passed away in 2006.

Thanks for the heads up. This account has been deleted. Unfortunately some people aren't taking this as seriously as we hoped. There are over 20mm Americans (mostly in rural areas) who have access to a fax machine but don't have the internet.

We have a feature to flag inappropriate profiles.

Thank you for your quick reaction. Good luck.

>Unfortunately some people aren't taking this as seriously as we hoped. There are over 20mm Americans (mostly in rural areas) who have access to a fax machine but don't have the internet.

The problem with your implementation is that you require your users have the Internet to create a profile and to receive a fax. Ideally you would have a phone number (different ones for men seeking women, women seeking men, men seeking men, women seeking women) that someone could send a fax to and receive back a random fax.

Psh, if anyone gets contacted via DTF you should submit the post to https://www.faxins.com, so the entire internet can laugh at your technologically impaired suitor!

Working link: http://www.faxins.com/

Oh, what a pity we had our landline phones disconnected earlier this century.

You're going to feel so weird saying that in 50 years.

Great, great, great idea. So simple, so beautiful, so non-IPO. Wish I would see more of that pure idealism around here.

it's like tacocopter for dating!

http://www.downtofax.com gives me a domain placeholder for some hosting company. https://www.downtofax.com gives me a certificate error. Best I can tell the DNS hasn't propogated everywhere yet.

There is a CNAME record for http://dtf.herokuapp.com though, and that URL seems to show the correct site for me.

It is not even Sunday in Australia yet. I am going to stay off the Internet all weekend now.

I was thinking the same thing. At risk of spoiling it for others -- is it april fools yet?

Brilliant! I'm rolling out PagerDuty as we speak.

What are you using to send the faxes?

I'd like to know as well. is there something like twillio for fax or something?

Phaxio, Twilio for phax: http://www.phaxio.com/

There's http://hellofax.com, wonderful service.

I'm definitely investing in this once it IPO's.

(P.S. Try downtofax.com, neither https://www. nor http://www. work.)

Would be even funner if it was "You DTMF?"

My favorite profile is the grue.

What a frightenly unambitious idea.

They now quote you saying that on the front page, btw. Linking to this comment.

I love these people so much...

Sorry, but no. This is OKCupid, or whatever, for fax machines. Which is weird, you know. Taking the "corporateness" and Extreme Seriousness connotations of fax, and the sexy fun vibe for dating, and mixing them... Sort of funny, if you asked me. I guess I'm not that eager on dating women who use faxes, in 2012, for dating. Total turn-off.

Now, first thing I thought was, this could be some app in which the user writes something, or draws something, scans it and it goes to a random's user printer. That's cool like ChatRoulette. It has all its penis-in-your-face potential, and all its ephimerous-beauty potential at the same time. I was dissapointed :(

Oh, and the SSL certificate is wrong. It's associated to a *.herokuapp.com . Please fix it.

Let it percolate in your mind for another half a minute. Everything will become obvious.

I'm utterly convinced that some people are missing the part of their brain that detects satire.

Well, yes. A lot of those people are going to be on HN as well. There are people who take things very literally. (To the point that analogy and metaphor become confusing.)

BTW: I love down to fax.

Not sure if I would want penis in my face potential...

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