67 Signals hasn't changed a thing
67signals.com
67signals.com
Every time I see things such as these I think: 20-something, doesn't understand money ($20/month seems "too much"), doesn't understand business, not much sense of humor either, mostly pissed about other being succesful...
The kind of people who write M$ with a dollar sign.
Based on the date the link was submitted to reddit was done around the same time as the Curebit fiasco. I like 37Signals but admittedly they did behave like arrogant aholes during it. Not something I'd expect from such well respected members of the tech community. The bit where DHH tweets their investors is what does it for me.
http://venturebeat.com/2012/01/28/cant-look-away/
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/31/this-site-mocks-37-...
And the meanness made me overlook the funny bits like the subheader about less and more, and some of the sections, the quote by Ghandi, and the completely gratuitous "Happy Wednesday" way up in the corner that changes, depending on the day (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19865106/how-does-37signa...).
I don't think he's too far off.
Point being getting so pissed to make an entire website about a company you don't like says more about you than it does the company.
You mean I'm in the bad making assumptions about a person making "a bunch of uninformed, knee-jerk assumptions" for other people in the form of a mean "parody" site?
Besides, who told you I "know nothing about" that person? I know what he wrote, and I know the tone he used. And I also have a pretty good sense of the kind of handle he'd use if he were to comment on HN.
>And why is this trash the top comment?
Because people agree and voted for it to be. It's social news site in case you don't know.
>Whether or not $20/month is too much does not depend on whether you have $20 to spend or not, it depends on the value you get from that $20. Products with very little value, and which have $0 alternatives that provide more value are not worth $20.
The value of something doesn't depend on what you say, it depends on what the market is willing to pay for it. Since they have a 10+ year, multi-million business with millions of customers, based on charging what they charge, I'd say the argument is pretty much settled.
If it feels like it ain't worth that much to you, you can use something else. I missed the part when using their service was mandatory. Or do you do parody sites for every "too expensive for me" product you find?
And, most important of all, to fit Swiftian parody it would have to be Swiftian-level good. This is subreddit level humor....
There's Juvenalian, which "addresses social evil through ridicule" and includes works like 1984, American Psycho, Family Guy, A Modest Proposal, and, I guess, this 67signals thing.
Then there's Horatian, which "playfully criticizes some social vice through gentle, mild, and light-hearted humour" and is a lot of Twain, The Simpsons, Dr. Strangelove, and the Friedisms thing I linked to.
Hard to say what the social evil is that the folks who wrote 67signals say they're fighting against. Possibly success. Possibly some angry comments DHH made when a startup took their code: http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/31/this-site-mocks-37-...
(Anyway, apologies for the tangent--I went to a liberal arts school and there's a dusty corner of my brain that still likes this stuff.)
Yes. If you went to high school, you may recall a certain type of person: They'd pick someone else, anyone else, and make fun of them for no reason other than to elevate themselves as an arbiter of taste.
"Ewww, reg is wearing a bow tie. What a fashion disaster!"
Do they? That isn't my experience.
>treat […] their […] customers well
Do they? That isn't my experience.
I have read "Getting Real" and have seen a number of their articles they've posted on customer service and taking care of their employees over the years. What have your experiences been?
Plus, whether it's your experience or not is irrelevant. The general consensus is that they do both. You won't find many people in the industry believing otherwise, not many unsatisfied customers in their forums.
Your claim is just as baseless as the one you are responding to, which was pointing out how baseless the original claim "they make good software" was.
>not many unsatisfied customers in their forums.
They heavily censor their forums. I know lots of former customers of theirs who were more than just unsatisfied with them.
Judging from the fact that their service has good reviews in major media and millions of users, it doesn't sound anywhere near as baseless.
>They heavily censor their forums.
Any examples? Surely those mythical people know how to save a screenshot, right?
They have no reviews in major media. They have both good and bad reviews in minor media. The "millions of users" claim is not supported at all.
>Any examples? Surely those mythical people know how to save a screenshot, right?
Yes, I happen to collect screenshots of things that are well known every time anyone talks to me about anything just in case some random redditard wants proof that the sky is blue.
Well, I don't think PC Magazine, for one, is a "minor media" in the IT industry. Or that being called "best" in your category is a "bad review".
>The "millions of users" claim is not supported at all.
Supported by whom? You mean you don't believe the user numbers they give? Being able to support a 10+ year old company, with 40+ employess, expensive Chicago offices etc, I'd say the "millions of users" claim is just about right. Heck, just a product of Basecamp, Ruby of Rails has had millions of users. Oh, and this Jeff Bezos guy investing in them? I think he knows one thing or two, too.
>random redditard
OK, this is HN. You can now go back into the woodwork.
>OK, this is HN.
I believe that was his/her point. I'm clearly not the first person to have noticed that your contributions are few and far between, with much garbage taking up that in between. Your posts would be welcomed on reddit, here they serve only to drag HN down.
You somehow think this is acceptable, but find my contributions "garbage"? Last time I checked, my "garbage" contribution was the top thread in this post, whereas the "satire" shouldn't even be posted in the first place.
That is my experience.
Hmmm... I see we have reached an impasse.
Or, you know, you could provide some kind of details.
Two of those are subjective and I'll ignore. But it is educational, it links to alternatives to 37 signals products.
>I can't really think of anything 37signals has done to warrant this
The company and its reputation was built on aggressively bad-mouthing and trash-talking anyone and everyone they could. Remember when rails started out? Anyone who dared to like something other than their framework was an idiot (at best).
Interesting, this Wired article[0] seems to back up this perception. In this light the 67signals page may be somewhat insightful by parodying the opinionated-jerk rockstar programmer caricature, if a little too mean-spirited and lacking in wit.
[0] http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/magazine/16-03/mf_signals...
But, I don't think the software needs to be bad or they need to mistreat people to be parodied. If you can capture an element of something, then exaggerate it into absurdity. it's parody.
Also not so sure about attributing jealousy or hate as the motive here. I mean, it could be, but I just don't know what's on the author's mind (except that he/she clearly believes some things about the company to be absurd).
But, it does strike me that the only things worth parodying, for the most part, are those that either succeed or that fail in some very public or fantastic way.
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/31/this-site-mocks-37-...
http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/01/31/this-site-mocks-37-...
basically they're branding two digits + a common word. why not.
Personally, I prefer to brand things that make slightly more sense, but to each their own. it works just as well as branding an "io" at the end of something.
it's just about repeating it a few times, until it can be recalled, and once it can it's quick to get to.
so it still works though. I wonder if they have a general trademark claim against thirtysomething-signals :)
We are a Web company that handles projects including Web, Film, Photography and design.
We might be developing one in house if we can't find one that meets our needs.
Obviously we're pretty big fans of open-source. Let me know if you want beta access: http://praxis.coop/en/contact (forgive the website, it's new).
Some of the features we are looking for:
- Sales Opportunities/Leads with different stages (i.e. Identified, Qualified, In Process, etc.) (These would probably be similar to projects, just with different fields)
- Notes and history for Companies/Company "Users"
- Folders in the Files Section so, for example, we can separate Marketing Templates from Training Documentation.
- Dashboards such as Open Opportunities dollar amount, Closed Won Sales dollar amounts, etc.
- Alerts for phase completion. For example, when one phase of our project is complete, we either get an alert that this phase is complete, or the next phase is automatically created.
- Permissions.
I blogged about why I made the choice, i.e. what it has that other tools doesn't, here: http://www.databasesandlife.com/liquid-planner/
That's pretty hilarious and I love the Trello link!