Hacker News Reader

Comment by jforman | Hacker News Reader

This reading app has wonderful UX — my feedback is somewhat biased, admittedly, because it's ripped straight off from us (Inkling):

http://tinyurl.com/inkling-frommers-france

(yes, you have to create an account to view content, but it only takes a second)

View on HN

You guys really did create a wonderful UX for a very separate market segment. Admittedly, we did draw some conceptual inspiration from your reader. In my defense, I will say that UX/UI is very constrained by a set number of factors which make "sidebars" necessary/obvious/essential and the organization of them preferable over other organization possibilities (TOC on left, misc on right). I'll admit that you executed this arrangement visually much better than I did, in my attempt not to scalp.

I'm a big fan of Inkling, and you guys make me wish I was still in school so I could use your reader. Major props.

The UX is so constrained that you had no choice other than to straight up copy: a) a control to hide the table of contents with a semi-transparent strip hover; b) a table of contents with a near-identical layout; c) a "next page" bumper with opacity-on-hover; d) an annotation stream in a third, right-handed column; d) a cute octopus mascot; etc. etc.

That's not to mention the store.

I mean...imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but I draw a line at copying Otto the Octopus.

I'm not going to argue with you--we have a better service. Would you mind sending me a URL to an image of your octopus? He seems to be in hiding.

Hey, jforman seems to be afk, but here's what I found online:

http://ducksonly.com/images/81080-2.jpg

That's not to mention the store.

I mean...imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but I draw a line at copying Inky the Octopus.

After some thought, I have decided to revamp our logo: http://i.imgur.com/AkEyD.png

What do you guys think?

You should really be upset they had no interest in stealing any of your content, like those great articles about France (blocked behind a login). Value is in content, not some arbitrary public js + html. I draw the line on drawing porky the platypus, the other hidden inkling mascot which doesn't appear on inkling

Reply on news.ycombinator.com