Dropbox Acquires Mailbox | Hacker News Reader

Dropbox Acquires Mailbox

blog.dropbox.com

184 pointsnimz42 comments

Could... someone tell me what Mailbox is? (i.e. what makes it special.) Their website is weirdly devoid of an explanation.

It's a mail app with todo list/triage features. You can easily reorder items, set reminders for tomorrow/next week, etc.

Intro/promo vid: http://vimeo.com/54553882

It's a mail app that treats inbox triage like shoving all your physical messes in time-based closets instead of actually dealing with the mess (like Boomerang). But it has a few very clever swipe-based interactions that are an improvement upon every mail app around, and those alone are worthy of all the attention the app's received. Just like PTR, others can implement these interactions and the app won't be novel for much longer. But for now, it's the only one doing it.

Still, the whole thing smacks of Jobs-era Apple-like overabundant zeal.

It's a mailbox that attaches mail organization to gestures rather than buttons. Big whoop.

Small and incremental improvements over a current iteration can kick a product from "meh" to "must have". Remember the iPod?

You solve one minor annoyance in an existing product and you might just have the next Big Thing® on your hands.

At first I thought it was going to be a stupid app. But it's now my main email client. I'm even liking it more than my desktop app. One of the things that really sold me was the snooze options. I can quickly decide how to deal with specific emails: "later" (2hrs), this afternoon, this evening, tomorrow, next week, some day, OR my favorite - a specific time and date. Which has completely halted the use of my calendar. I'll set a time and date for an email to remind me of a meeting or appointment I have and when it arrives I have all the context about that event. Brilliant.

For those who are interested in alternatives, I recommend the TaskBox app. It's sort of a hybrid between a todo list and an inbox.

Now only if they launch an email service of their own and integrate Dropbox with it for stuff like attachments and we will have a potential GMail killer.

Well, if my files still map to a checksum hash that is compared to other's files for storage redundancy, I'll stay with Gmail for the privacy.

I think this statement really shows how our expectations of privacy have changed. You'd prefer GMail for it's privacy - That's the mail service that 'reads' your email and displays adverts based on it's content. Google clearly have the ability to access the plain text of your email so I'd be really surprised if they don't do some kind of storage de-duplication too.

(Unless of course you were being ironic and I misread you)

There's no reason to believe that Gmail doesn't do the same thing for attachments. It's entirely possible they dedupe in the same manner.

One of Larry Page's earliest papers is about dedup. Google itself has published papers on email deduplication.

When Dropbox sees a dup, it does not upload the file at all and therefore you know there is a dup. If I understand correctly, Gmail always uploads the attachment. When there is a dup Google saves storage space. Users will never noticed any difference.

That just makes the potential privacy violation undetectable, though. Doesn't remove it in any way.

Any email service that isn't deduping attachments is being fiducially irresponsible.

Why is that a problem? With something like Dropbox itself, there's potentially timing info exposed that would let you discover if someone else already had stored that file. But surely e-mail is far too asynchronous for that, and obliterates any timing information.

We can hope!

Google does that with Drive already.

I think most other people would call that feature creep. The day Dropbox does anything more than sync files is the day I stop using Dropbox.

I don't care if new features continually creep into Dropbox, so long as the service is kept simple and invisible. The Dropbox service, I suspect, is super-super-super-super-super-super-super-super-super complicated. But Dropbox made file syncing so simple that the software is essentially invisible to the end-user. I believe it is possible for Dropbox to continue adding new feature while keeping their service relatively invisible. The multi-billion dollar question is will they.

Wow. Just over a month ago they were posting their "Week 1 In Review," that was a fast acquisition!

This one is actually quite exciting I think though. They already have the product, but they need to scale like crazy. A company like Dropbox will help massively with that, and hopefully the service will grow without the Twitter-esque growing pains we're used to.

I'd far rather see these guys acquired by a company interested in keeping the product, than a company who just needs a talented team.

But it started two years ago: http://www.mailboxapp.com/story/ and http://www.crunchbase.com/company/orchestra

"Whether it’s your Dropbox or your Mailbox, we want to find ways to simplify your life." Great tagline! Synergies are even present at the brand level. :)

I hope dropbox builds on what Mailbox is currently doing. It would suck if mailbox just went away because Dropbox just wanted to get some more talent.

I think this is obviously not just a talent acquisition. An email client is something that Dropbox needs in the long run to provide awesome integrated experience for your productivity tasks. Without it, they won't be able to compete with Google on user experience.

I'm really happy for this acquisition. It could be an early sign of a new trend in which companies heading to IPO buy strategic products and teams in the early stages to build something awesome together.

Facebook's Instagram acquisition could be seen this way, but it was much more defensive move. Mailbox acquisition is clearly done from more win-win perspective.

The funny thing is that I think Mailbox has put much care and ingenuity into their iPhone app than Dropbox has. The 2007 four tabs at the bottom UI is not the best way to browse your files.

What's wrong with tabs?

I'm personally not a big fan of designers trying to out-clever user familiarity by getting rid of tabs (or other standard interaction models to which users are accustomed).

Are tabs sexy? Maybe not, or at least designers don't think so. However, tabs are very well placed in terms of usability, very familiar to users, instantly understandable, and a lot less complicated than the back-bending design gymnastics some designers are doing just to be different from Apple.

Same here, what the guy doesn't understand is that tab based scale easily when doing universal apps.

The tabs move over to a side panel on the iPad. Works out of the box and offers the ability to write a single code base for both platforms.

Most designers ("UX monkeys") are too dumb to realise this as they are just Photoshop slingers and can't code for shit nor know the SDK.

It has an amazing cost benefit when you're a small startup and want to push to both platforms without compromising design.

Seriously, Tab based works wonders when doing universal - mostly because it's out of the box. Another way is the side panel. Now that comes out of the box for iPad, but not iPhone.

Using a tab gives you the ability to have a tab on the iPhone and side panel on the iPad with as little change as possible.

Suspect it was more likely that he thinks the ease of development shouldn't be the sole consideration in the design of an app.

Just because the SDK makes it easy does not make it the best design solution.

I may lack coding chops, but you lack imagination.

Don't let the coders design, I guess. http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2009/03/10/designers-are-not-p...

I replied above: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5382745

I do have imagination, but I also do logic. What you don't grasp that iOS developers who can design kinda make most designers useless. They can figure out the cost/benefit of particular design details.

You got a long run way, sure, go ahead and customise the crap out of everything. Short run way? Try to custom the native components (tabs,navigation bars, action-sheets and etc).

Most designers are too stupid to actually be able to figure out that some things are hard to do.

Makes me thing of the strike through and "bold" text when the iOS SDK first came out. Trying to convince designers that a check mark would take a minute to do compared to a strike through was such a fucking hell and left a bad taste in my mouth. Our run way was short, the SDK new and certain things didn't come out of the box.

The cost benefit analysis is in the developers hand. If he/she can design then that makes outside designers useless.

The only thing I actually need is illustrators for icons and drawings. Designers and/or "Mobile UX Experts" are redundant.

I think that you don't actually disagree with me. Dropbox does not have a short runway, so I don't know why you keep bringing that up.

Obviously, development and design are not mutually exclusive. Loren Brichter for example, is a great designer and a great developer. By not relying on Apple's standard components, he created one of the best Mac apps (Tweetie) which set a new bar for Mac apps and inspired others to do the same (Sparrow).

I like when designers and developers who are perfectionists work together: http://www.cabel.name/2007/09/coda-toolbar-and-three-pixel-c....

If you can't implement the designs that you dream of, don't convince yourself that the dream wasn't a good one. It sounds like the app you were working on was a to-do list of sorts. I suppose that you think that too much thought went into the design of this app, then: http://culturedcode.com/things/iphone/makingof/ Somehow, they managed to ship a finished product in 2008 without sacrificing good design.

This obviously is only capable if you have enough resources, including development talent. Do you think that Dropbox lacks the resources to create a better app? Or is your point that we should quit when it gets too hard?

I'm talking general run way, not Dropbox. If you can cut your costs efficiently, you should, regardless of who you are.

I am not saying you should rely on native standards without innovating, I am saying a developer is a better person to make those decisions where you wanna tweak design that might be hellish in code than a designer.

I like developers who can design. Period. Especially iOS where the damn controllers are called -VIEW-Controllers. If you're a startup, get a iOS developer who can design. It's cheaper, it's smarter. It's better. Less person to maintain, less communication errors and those thing happen because we're human.

It's one of the platforms where the developer SHOULD be able to design and rightfully do so.

I've never come to respect designers for iOS (I can't speak for Android, but I wonder if it's the same). One trick ponies. If you can't code your views, then get a different job. I am sure there are developers who can design and then code it. http://flyosity.com

Don't get those oil snakes men that trick you into thinking their bullshit user interface design education is worth anything.

The only objective UX is speed, and that comes from the developer. Most of the time UX (and design) is subjective. Sure you have bad ones, and good ones, but in the end it's mostly a matter of taste. Get a developer who has taste.

Most developers are also "app users", so they should be aware of what works and what doesn't and can work in their own "smart" features. Drag to refresh, swipe for menu and etc. Design comes with that.

Having worked for so many UX dickheads, who were just managers who couldn't code... or even better "idea-cunts" I've come to hate them more than MBA's. At least an MBA knows stuff I might not be aware of.

It's not just about run way. I rather have 2-3 developers who can design than mixing in some non-dev who just wastes everyones time.

So you have a design suggestion (read IDEA)? Woopdi-fucking do so do my 3 developers as well. Except they can code it.

That's what UX people are.. idea guys... managers...useless.

"Getting into the tech scene when you have no skills" - Easy, just tell them you're a product and UX guy http://josephwalla.com/getting-into-the-tech-scene-when-you-...

Tabs are a great starting point since they're so close to your thumb, but that's not enough. And Dropbox can afford the best.

I haven't put much thought into designing a file system app, so here goes nothing:

* The Camera Upload tab assumes that you're using it. Make it a list item in the main content tab.

* Create a special folder called Clipboard, give it its own tab with a big plus button. When you add a file to the Clipboard, you can instantly copy the link to it.

* The current sharing screen is daunting [http://d.pr/i/8v2r], and doesn't keep up with the SDK [http://d.pr/i/5Z1g].

* On Mac, let people add files to Clipboard by dragging files to the menu bar icon like getcloudapp.com.

* As a bonus, I'd like a visualization of your largest files and folders vs. those that are are accessed most often.

As an Android user who has never tried Mailbox, what makes it so great? (briefly)

As an iPhone user who has tried Mailbox, nothing.

It's super fast and enticing to triage emails immediately rather than letting them gather dust in your inbox. Not much in the way of revolutionary features, but it definitely makes the entire workflow noticeably smoother.

1) The app is extremely well designed 2) There are some slick features that are virtually friction less to use such as telling the app to remind you about an email next week. 3) with #1 and #2 combined you have a more pleasant email experience than other clients.

All that being said, the problem with Mailbox as a standalone company is this: http://pandodaily.com/2013/02/11/wham-bam-thank-you-mailbox/

How long till we see Dropbox go public?

Congrats Gentry and team!! If you'd like Gmail + Dropbox attachment management now, use Attachments.me

any word on if orchestra will still be worked on / going to dropbox?

That's exactly what I came here to ask. I hated Mailbox, but love Orchestra and use Orchestra daily. I hope they keep it around, but I have an odd feeling that they won't.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com