Notes on making a multiplayer "doing nothing app" | Hacker News Reader

Notes on making a multiplayer "doing nothing app"

untested.sonnet.io

107 pointsrpastuszak45 comments

I love the idea. The world needs more kind apps. There's another app I'm using called derive which just pins a random place on a map within 10km of me and I have to go there. That's it. No extra bells or whistles. The interface is super minimal and it's made by one person as a hobby. It encourages exploration.

There should be a sort game like this. Like it shows me a mostly dark map like in video games and as I move around, the maps gets revealed (within 100m radius or within algorithmically determined visibility radius or something). The game would be to open new areas on a map like you would on a video game.

Zenly (recently went bust) did this!

https://blog.mapbox.com/clear-the-fog-with-zenly-fc7778b06c3...

> Zenly’s location tech works in real time to uncover the map as you cover more ground. Zenly’s location tracking runs in the background, updating automatically as you check out new neighborhoods and take road trips.

(it's very social though I think, more "compete with friends!" than "explore your neighborhood & find delight in small things)

There's also https://fogofworld.app, which does this since 2012 and has a big community of people using dedicated "tracking phones" or other gadgets to be as accurate as possible.

A bit different but when I was cycling during the pandemic, I got into https://wandrer.earth where the goal is to bike every street in your area.

Thanks. I’ve been meaning to do this in one of my towns and kept putting off finding this site. :)

This is a great video about this.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=1c8i5SABqwU

Can you link the app? I can't find it

It might be this? https://deriveapp.com/s/v2/

Woops. The app I actually meant was called Geohash Droid. Derive app is a similar concept about exploring your surroundings but with activities and tasks. Both are great.

https://deriveapp.com/s/v2/

I think geohash droid was based on this comic: https://xkcd.com/426/

Seems like you would enjoy geocaching

More like geohashing

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geohashing

https://geohashing.site/

https://xkcd.com/426/

SCENE JERRY'S APARTMENT

JERRY

so the app does nothing

ELAINE

get out!

JERRY

no really, the app is about doing nothing

GEORGE

Jerry did I tell you my parents moved back to del Boca vista? If anyone is doing nothing it's them!

ELAINE

so what do you do with the app if it does nothing

JERRY PRESSES A BUTTON ON THE APP AND IT CHIMES. KRAMER BUSTS THROUGH THE DOOR LOOKING CONFUSED.

JERRY

well it's made that a lot more predictable.

SEINFELD THEME PLAYS

Love it! :)

The app sounds like Kramer's idea actually :)

KRAMER

(slides in to the Jerry's place) (with the excited voice)

Jerry! I have an idea. An app that does nothing. (screams and shakes his head) NOTHING!

turns out it was Newman's "hello world" program that he made at a tech boot camp

he was trying to make an app that would repel dogs by playing an ultra-high frequency sound only they would hear

after discovering its real effect, he tried getting kramer to buy the app in exchange for free dead-mail storage at kramers apartment

It's actually George's idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXYWZhN8Yks

isn't there any AI we can feed this to have a little sketch in video form?

i fed it to a biological neural network that was eventually able to return a fuzzy but satisfying render to my sensorium

There was an AI doing nonstop video streaming of Seinfeld episodes for a while there. Not sure if it was taken down but it did get in hot water for a bit when it had the cast say some inappropriate things.

It's still going. Some of the real cast have actually said some inappropriate things.

In a Seinfeld episode, is the laughter noise in the script or is it just up to the editor to figure out when to add it in post?

Whereas I like the idea, isn’t being able to communicate with others the antithesis of „doing nothing“? We’re actually NOT doing nothing anymore, but doing something besides sitting and waiting?!

The idea is sweet, but I agree, by communicating you're no longer "doing nothing". Then again, mindfulness can also be cultivated by just focusing on one single task at a time.

You aren’t ever doing nothing. That act of doing nothing is something.

One of the reasons I made the original/single player Sit. (sit.sonnet.io) was that I practice shi-ne, which involves "doing nothing" rather than focusing on a specific subject/thought/emotion.

This is just a sketch so I might scale it down or split into different toys at some point, depending on how people interact with it.

This thread is really valuable feedback for me, so thank you! I honestly didn't expect more than 5-10 people visiting:)

It puts me more in mind of the multiplayer aspect of Journey; you see other players, but you can't really do much with them other than follow them around and see where they're headed to e.g. find secrets. But you can talk to them using chirrups and controls like jumping and running around. I found it wholesome as fuck, and most others that have played it will have their own experiences running into a random stranger, or eventually having to say their goodbyes, or losing them, etc.

> wholesome as fuck

I mean. Sure.

Author here, I 100% agree with you. That's why I also made Sit. (https://sonnet.io/posts/sit/) as a more extreme version of this concept. Sit. is just a timer with a black screen.

I see doing nothing as a spectrum and this is doing less than say doomscrolling or messaging someone via social media. When I meditate, simply doing nothing is actually really hard!

PS I eat my own dogfood: I use Sit. and Ensō (enso.sonnet.io) every single morning. I write my morning notes with Ensō and meditate with Sit. because I like how the timer works (and because I got used to it during testing:) )

"I wasted so much time trying to get this done in a few hours." Alternatively, I've wasted a lot of time going down rabbit holes, trying to create the best design that will save me from headaches down the road. I still haven't figured out that balancing act.

For me, I have just been going with my first instinct and moving on. I am trying to complete more of the projects I start, and I have found that I just accept I might cause myself trouble later, I will work on it then.

https://sit-together-toy.vercel.app/

I saw this (https://is-it-over.jevakallio.partykit.dev/) website and chuckled seeing all of the mouse pointers from around the world clicking a single toggle back and forth.

I love these "dumb" apps so much. I made a San Francisco version and check it from time to time, I really gotta know whether SF is back: https://is-sf-back.cconeill.partykit.dev/

I couldn't get scrolling to work on this site. Turns out all the content is on the left half; if you scroll while mousing over the right half it won't have any effect.

Posting this in case anyone else has the same confusion.

Yeah I think the right field is supposed to have some navigation components, but it's completely unpopulated.

Yeah, sorry for that! I'm planning to move away from Obsidian Publish once I have more time.

For now I'm trying to focus on writing and sharing (sometimes half-finished) work, rather than polishing the site template, which is a huge temptation for me tbf.

PS. I'm also writing a mini-review of Obsidian Publish. I might use your comment if that's ok with you.

A small tweak would be to use a background color on the render-container similar to Andy Matuschak's site — or a border/shadow on the side of each pane

https://notes.andymatuschak.org

Edit: Deploying a change to Publish sites that should make the scroll area clearer :)

Sweet, thanks Steph!

> Now, every time a gong goes off, the droplet belonging to a person will ripple gently. There's no audio. Just the acknowledgement that they're there.

I do get audio. Perhaps the design was changed?

> I will rush less. I wasted so much time trying to get this done in under a few hours.

It's so hard to work on things when you only have a few hours a day to focus on something.

By "chirps", I was expecting bird sounds, which I think would be charming.

I would love to be able to subscribe via RSS to your blog !

https://untested.sonnet.io/rss.xml

Website says on the bottom right that it’s “Powered by Obsidian Publish” so that seemed like a request for the platform more than the website. Searched online for “Obsidian Publish RSS” and found a feature request on their forum.

https://forum.obsidian.md/t/rss-feed-for-obsidian-publish/18...

Last post points out there are feeds at `/rss.xml`.

https://forum.obsidian.md/t/rss-feed-for-obsidian-publish/18...

I'll an RSS feed soon, just trying to focus on writing first atm. I'll be moving away from obsidian to something that gives me more control.

For now, I've just added a newsletter feed: https://letters.sonnet.io

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