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Comment by crcsmnky | Hacker News Reader

I disagree. Given what the app is about, I don't care about the UI. In fact, I'd rather they spend more time on the backend than on the website - at least to get started. Bootstrap is familiar, it's not bad - there's a difference.

Once the service is proven to work and they've got customers, I'm sure a UI refresh would happen. At this stage it's probably more important to worry about the things that matter most to the longevity of the project.

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Agreed. Stuck between working on the product and working on UI I chose an admittedly weak UI (I'm not crazy about it but it works) so I could work on more important, for now, pieces of the product

I respectfully disagree with both of you. This shouldn't be a case of not having enough time, make time and get both parts to a decent level. Creating a bespoke splash page should be the easiest bit.

You need to take your developer hats off and put your salesmen hats on if you want to sell your product.

I respectfully disagree with you. :)

When I encounter a site with Bootstrap showing, I don't think "oh, this person doesn't care about the value of having a custom UI, or doesn't know how to sell their product" - I think "this person knows where their priorities lie, and has optimized their effort towards the things that provide the most value for their business". I'm sure when a custom UI becomes something more worth prioritizing, it will be moved up the list of things to do.

Hm, my impression is more along the lines of, "this probably was hacked together in a weekend and might be discarded in another." It's not a fair impression, but my snap judgment is that if somebody is invested in their product, they'd put a little time into differentiating its look.

However, the homepage for this product emphasizes its use as an API, so I am not very concerned about look and feel at all, and am much more interested in API docs. It looks like these are not ready yet.

I spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year with service providers and vendors as lead developer/devops/sysadmin/etc at a tech consulting firm in Chicago.

I don't give a damn how the site looks; if you're solving a problem I need to get solved, I'm taking my Amex out to pay for it if it makes our work easier.

Good to hear! You in the market for a solution like EasyPost? I'm at jarrett@easypost.co and would love to chat!

I am! Will have an email off to your shortly!

I totally agree, in most areas. But I think in this area there's enough of a problem that I'm not having to sell it as much--yet. It's not like I'm trying to get someone to sign up for a location check-in gamified mobile app, it's something that would solve a real pain point. And for now, I just wanted to find out how bad people want that solution.

I call this my "pragmatic hat"

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