Comment by ccmoberg | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ccmoberg | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Thanks for the feedback! Two quick questions for you:

Re: holdup #2) Are you saying you would prefer that it automatically post to social networks all the time, or that you would prefer to not have preferential treatment of users that are willing to make a post? Or that the default should be to post with an opt-out option?

Re: holdup #3) Our native apps currently only run on Android 4.0+ because those are the only devices where we can guarantee five-point multitouch capability. There are a large number of 2.3.3 and 3.0 devices that are capable, but there is no way for us to limit downloads to only those devices while simultaneously disallowing downloads to devices with those operating systems that can only do 2 or 4 point multitouch (and we definitely don't want to allow customers that don't have 5 multitouch capability to download our apps).

Our HTML5/JS SDK doesn't have such problems, though, and works on 80%+ of the current installed smartphone user base.

Also, re: holdup #1) We can make the stamps slimmer, but don't really have a reason to. We like having an analog to the inked stamps everyone has used at some point in their life, and this form factor does just that. IF someone wants to build an app that requires a more portable version of the stamp, we'd be happy to build stamps for them with a slimmed-down form factor.

Thanks again for the feedback!

Hey cool, talking to an employee! I do really like your concept.

2) I guess I don't like the concept that posting to a social network gives one more punch than not doing so. I don't have an aversion to twitter or facebook etc, I use them all the time. What I don't like seeing is auto-generated posts from my friends flooding my news feed. I'll admit I have no better solution than you've devised, and I completely understand the decision. Some others might have more of a backlash against it though. You may have seen some vitrol on here whenever someone sees a "login with Facebook" link on a startup's page.

3) That makes sense. It's kind of disappointing from a technical limitation standpoint, though. The reason I called it out as possibly being a barrier to entry is because 4.0+ still isn't terribly common. While iOS is very common, I was sad to see Windows Phone, Blackberry, and other touchscreen smartphone platforms not included. Like I mentioned in my footnotes, we're used to it, but I still like to call it out.

1) Not a problem. My criticisms were posted just because I like to give positive and negatives to interesting startups I see and like. There are some things people might not see from the inside out. This is a very non-traditional checkout method, and I could see non-traditional businesses loving it. Good to know you're willing to work with them to meet their needs. When I wrote that I was thinking more along the lines of alternative use-cases other than POS terminals. The ideas you have are just the beginning of where this technology can go.

Thanks again - feedback at this stage is golden!

1) This is useful feedback. If a client doesn't want to grant additional credits for social posts, we can certainly disable that feature. Unfortunately, most clients we have talked to see this as one of the main selling points. I agree - autopost spam on my news feeds sucks. This is one reason why our current MO is to have this be an opt-in feature after every stamp interaction.

3) Our HTML5/JS SDK will work on any phone running a webkit based browser. We're working on a code package for the new IE, though until we see more demand, it will be a relatively low priority. I'm not sure Blackberry is worth any expenditure of our resources right now, though if we had a developer who really wanted, we could probably make it happen.

Have you thought of mounting the pad to a wall or a stand, so visitors or customers could stamp their phones as they passed?

Maybe it could be used for building entry controls, like a keycard? (The app could authenticate with a server in the building, then the server could tell that specific door to unlock) Maybe this could be done with Zipcars?

The stamps have a threaded bolt hole machined into them for this very purpose! We actually built a system very similar to what you describe (secure space access authentication) at the TechCrunch Disrupt Hackathon in SF back in September. Our project (amazingly) won the whole damn hackathon: http://snow.sh/ack

Wow, a universal lock? Amazing!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com