Show HN: A directory of startups that did things that don't scale | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: A directory of startups that did things that don't scale

dothingsthatdontscale.org

31 pointsrgyc12 comments

Hey HN,

I've been working on a little side project and could really use your feedback.

So, I've always been fascinated by those stories of successful startups doing crazy things in their early days - you know, like Airbnb founders personally photographing listings or DoorDash founders delivering food themselves.

I started collecting these stories, and before I knew it, I had a pretty big list. So I thought, "Why not turn this into a website?" And that's how https://dothingsthatdontscale.org was born.

It's super basic right now - just a simple directory with about 70 examples. But I'm wondering if this could be useful for other founders or startup enthusiasts.

I'd love to hear your thoughts:

> Is this something you'd find helpful? Why or why not?

> What would make this more useful for you?

> Is it easy to use? (I'm not good at design)

> Am I missing any awesome stories that should be included?

I'm not trying to monetize this or anything - just want to create something helpful for the community. Any feedback, criticism, or ideas would be hugely appreciated!

Thanks in advance, you awesome people!

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After looking a while at the 1 degree rotated <div>s, even HN feels tilted. It's a nice effect, but I would only use it as an animation while hovering (i.e. animate from 0 degree to 1 degree rotation, if you must. Otherwise, don't do it to keep the interface clean). Personally, I would leave out all animations, unless they visually help the user with a certain task.

And since you're asking, here's a few things that come to mind regarding the design:

- Stick to one font family. There seems no need to semantically distinguish different parts of the text; the use of font size and decoration already take care of that. I would keep the Bricolage Grotesque and ditch the monospace font.

- It should be interesting to read the stories on the main page, but in the current setting, three columns (on 1920x1080) feels to crowded. Two columns seems to be okay for that screen size, but perhaps three columns work as well if the padding is a bit different (see next point).

- Try fiddling around with the left and right padding in the quotation blocks, as well as text justification. On smaller screens, there's about three to four words on each line, and lots of empty space.

- The ten "things to do" are identically styled as the call to action buttons ("Share your story" in the menu bar, "Start doing things that don't scale"), but there's no action involved. I think the quotation block style would be better: blue background, yellow title (e.g. "Ask for help and referrals"), white text (e.g. "Leverage your network for initial users and incentivize them to refer others to rapidly expand your user base."). The user can easily distinguish the important stuff (title) from the accompanying explanation, and it doesn't look clickable.

And some other nits:

- A few "Source" links are broken.

- Privacy Policy gives a 404.

- On the /startups page, I already forgot what the ten recommendations were. Perhaps add ten filters that automatically select the stories that involve the particular recommendation.

- Does the epicness scale go from 1 (low) to 10 (high) (or 5 it seems?)

Thanks for your great feedback! You gave me lots of good ideas to make the site better. I'll fix the turning boxes and work on the layout. I'll also make the text easier to read and fix the broken links. Your ideas about the "things to do" part and adding ways to sort stories are very helpful. Thank you for taking the time to help me improve!

This is a nice art installation that gives a positive vibe! You made something out of your fascination and admiration and that feeling spreads to the visitor. I think you should embrace this as an art installation whose purpose is to just exist, instead of trying to make it useful to people. That’s a startup way of thinking, but maybe this thing doesn’t need to be practical.

Wow, I love how you see this as art! I hadn't thought of it that way. It's cool to think about it as something that just shares good feelings. Thanks for giving me a new way to look at my project.

> Most startups fail because they focus on scaling too soon.

You sure about that?

Other than that....Great site by the way :)

Haha, I should definitely reconsider its accuracy. Thank you for questioning that and for the kind words about the site!

Looks very cool. I like that it links to the source as well. Curious though: how are you coming up with the 2-sentence description at the top of each example?

I'm happy you like the site and the links! For the short bits at the top, I sum up the main points from the stories. I should make it clear these are my words, not quotes.

Nice idea. I would recommend improve mobile view by adjusting paddings and margins

Thanks for looking at my site! You're right about making it work better on phones. I'll fix the spacing to make it easier to use on small screens.

me: "this is great advice"

also me: "I have no interest in working on things that don't scale"

Haha, it's a great point about the paradox of this advice! It's true that not everyone will want to (or should) focus on unscalable things.

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