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akcreekon Ask HN: What is your desk / room / general working environment like?

I'll share my home setup - I like it better than the office:

+ Desk: LAX series by Mash Studios

+ Chair: Vintage Pollock Executive

+ Computer: 15" Retina Macbook Pro

+ Monitor: Apple 20" Cinema Display

+ Keyboard: Apple USB with keypad

+ Music: Spotify, eclectic mix - mostly indie

+ Hours: All kinds - whenever it feels right when I can

akcreekon Apply HN: Let’s Fix Live Chat/Support

A few other tid-bits:

Business Case:

Potential customers are nearly endless since all businesses need customer service and even the smallest are now offering live chat. The market is extremely large as proven by the volume and size of current live chat companies. There are many ways to find an initial customer base; builtwith searching for businesses using the various live chat services and reaching out to them, YC’s network, acquiring a live chat service, partnering and integrating with platforms such as Shopify, etc.

Issues:

SMS/MMS has a cost per send. With volume this cost is very low, but still real. I believe this is a cost of doing business that is worthwhile to improve customer satisfaction.

There are others working in the same area. Intercom.io is kind of on this track. They have the platform to integrate the channels, but they don't have all the channels.

Test:

I took a couple of hours and built a quick SMS/MMS demo using the Twilio API and tested it with some friends - playing out customer service situations. It felt great being able to use the standard text interface I use all day long to get service. I was able to send images, video, pickup the conversation on my macbook (messages), etc. A small taste of the vision, but it was very nice indeed!

akcreekon Why use www?

301 redirect the naked domain to the www and you can keep telling people the same thing - they will be redirected to the www version seamlessly.

akcreekon How I Created a $350M Software Company Knowing Nothing About Software

It would be closer for sure, but $10MM was ARR, so the value of the business was likely $30MM+. The $350MM number was the value at IPO.

akcreekon Breakout List 2015

I’ll say it again — avoid random startups! In the words of Sam Altman, “unless you are getting multiple percent of equity, it’s usually a bad deal to join an early-stage startup that hasn’t yet found product-market fit and the resulting growth (there is a big exception here for hard tech startups that will take a long time to produce a product but be incredibly valuable if they’re able to).”

I've seen advice to not work for startups that aren't well on their way to becoming the next big thing at least a dozen times this month. Instead go with an established company (Google often mentioned at this point). It seems that this sentiment is spreading quickly right now and often backed up by citing lower wages and lottery type chances at the equity being worth anything in the future. This article gets into it a bit as well as noted in the above quote.

Maybe it is a vocal minority right now, but it seems that it will be difficult for "random" startups to get anywhere if they can't bring talent onboard.

akcreekon All the Product Reviews Money Can Buy

It is very common for sites to allow non-verified purchasers to leave reviews. Amazon works this way. You'll see reviews on Amazon all the time where people specifically mention that they bought it somewhere else. I've always wondered why someone would leave a legitimate review on Amazon for a product they didn't buy from Amazon. Maybe the answer is that they aren't legitimate though.

Some review software notes when a reviewer is a verified purchaser. I look for that when reading reviews because at least they have the product in question.

akcreekon Prices for starter homes are crowding out millennials

What about the opportunity cost of the $66,000 you put down? You could likely earn more than $200/mo pretty easily with $66,000 in cash to utilize. It is too simplistic to say you are saving $200/mo just because the monthly P&I payment is $200 less than a rent payment. That doesn't take into account what you could have done with the cash, property tax, maintenance, etc... Of course the big unknown is the future value of the property, which makes this very difficult to calculate accurately.

I've looked at this several times and renting typically comes out on top for me. I still decided to own though because I couldn't find what I wanted to rent and I care more about where I live than making sure it is the smartest purchase I can make.

akcreekon How Far Can a Motorcycle Lean in a Turn?

Many racers, including the referenced GP crowd use 16.5" wheels instead of the more standard OE 17" since you can mount a wider/taller tire. That profile allows increased lean angle due to better grip from the additional surface area of the tire contacting the track surface.

akcreekon WEB DEVELOPER (DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES)

My ecommerce business is based out of Los Angeles and our shipping clerk gets that. I wish he knew a dozen programming languages... unfortunately he is still training on email. He can pack the hell out of a box though.

akcreekon Jet.com’s Valuation Nears $600M Before Launch

> Take advantage of Jet’s audience of millions of loyal shoppers and build a direct relationship with the customers you acquire.

I don't understand how companies can make claims like this [1]. Unless I'm missing something this has to be false considering they haven't launched yet and their homepage says 350K people have signed up for early access.

I run an online business and a couple of our competitors make false claims very regularly about being #1 (quarterly ranking from the MFG has us at #1 every time). I just can't imagine making a false claim like that - and knowing it is false.

[1] https://partner.jet.com/

akcreekon Show HN: iOS Notes Made Beautiful

This is our first app for sale in the app store (we've built a few internal apps for companies that weren't available on the app store). If HN has any thoughts on the site, app, etc... we're all ears. Thanks.

akcreekon The New Deal

I ended up with 3 Watsi blue logo t-shirts from Teespring because they said they weren't happy with the quality of the first 2. I kept the 3rd for myself but gave the other two away. They are certainly committed to delivering quality.

akcreekon My website was stolen by a hacker and I got it back

Thanks for reaching out - just sent you an email back.

akcreekon My website was stolen by a hacker and I got it back

We exchanged 47 emails from the 24th to the 28th. If I can grab some time I'll put a different kind of post together... more about the interactions, which were very up and down with this guy. I don't write a blog or anything so not sure where I'd post it though.

akcreekon My website was stolen by a hacker and I got it back

The buyer can't stop the payment as the wire is already complete and money in escrow.com's account. Escrow.com had to stop the payment and in this case they did so because there was a request from law enforcement.

akcreekon My website was stolen by a hacker and I got it back

I (Anthony from the story) negotiated the price with the seller to $3,500. I had Jordan wire that to escrow.com while we waited for the domain, db and files to be transferred. We made this decision because nobody was helping (hosts/law enforcement) and with this action the worst case scenario became paying $3,500 for the site (assuming the seller didn't back out). After this the FBI took the case and they were involved in stopping the funds from transferring.

I'm positive she would have gotten it back eventually even if it did sell to someone else and they took control, but it could have been a more lengthy process and her entire living is derived from the website and the business associated with it. Having it out of her control for any amount of time could have been very damaging.

I had a Flippa account with history and no visible connection to her so the seller did not know that I was working with the actual site owner and she was working with the FBI.

The investigation is still ongoing and I've had some interesting conversations with the seller (thief is more accurate) since the money was frozen.

akcreekon An Early Retirement

I appreciate what Watsi does, but I'm mostly buying a shirt because of the great speech Chase gave at Startup School [1]. It was of the most value to me at that event. Thanks.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlT3UhC7NwQ

akcreekon Pinterest Passes Twitter In Popularity, Facebook Stays On Top

I use Pinterest (http://www.pinterest.com/anthonycreek/), but I'm quite selective of what I pin so I can easily see and appreciate everything on my boards. I also only have a handful of boards.

I see people with dozens of boards and thousands (even tens of thousands) of pins. I don't know what the point of that is unless you are trying to simply grow your following by being everywhere.

akcreekon Show HN: Plant Subscription Service

I love this... wish I was in the delivery area (about 2,000 miles away in Louisville, KY) as my wife and I have been wanting to expand our selection of plants, but neither of us have the knowledge off hand nor the time to invest in learning right now. Lots of things to learn higher up on the list still. This certainly solves a problem we have.

akcreekon Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet

Probably not very as it really isn't all that small. It will basically be two rooms; the bathroom with shower, sink and toilet and then the living area with a bed that can be closed off to the rest of the room with a curtain or moveable wall. The rest of the room will be a small kitchen and living area. No laundry is planned so that makes it a bit easier and I don't have to store everything I own in the space. I will implement some storage solutions, but I'm not going to get crazy about it. Just simple things.

Will probably end up something like the wee house layout wise, though not as modern in design: http://www.weehouse.com/wee/

The building is pretty cool as it was originally an ice cream parlor in the 1950's. It was going to be demolished, but a group saved it and moved it to the current location and now I'm taking it over.

I actually got the building for free since I bought the commercial building in front of it (well, negotiated it into the deal so I call it free). The commercial building was built in the 1860's and also saved by the same group. It is pretty unbelievable - has an arched doorway in the back where the horse/wagon pulled in with supplies for the general store and tavern that were in the ground floor. I'm going to finish out an apartment upstairs and have two commercial spaces downstairs - one for my business and one to lease out.

akcreekon Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet

200 sq ft would be hard for me personally, but mid-January I'm closing on a 375 sq ft building that I'm converting to a living space for myself, my wife and our dog. It will be short term for us while we restore the main building though... probably 18-24 months. After that it we'll use it as a guest house and I'll probably put it on Airbnb or similar as well. I've always wanted to live in a smaller space though so I'm excited. I'm used to about 1,000 sq ft, but we keep most of that empty really.

akcreekon Show HN: A small (less than 2 kb) CSS framework

Why a 10 column grid? 12 makes much more sense to me since it is divisible by 2, 3, 4 and 6 while 10 is only divisible by 2 and 5. 12 gives more options with hardly any additional styles.

akcreekon TrollingMotors.net Auction Follow-Up

Follow up from: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6733680

akcreekon Show HN: Simple aggregator that scrapes hotels, hotwire, airbnb, jetsetter, etc.

I thought I'd check back and see how it is going today and I noticed something else; after you hover over an image thumbnail the border-radius disappears so the image is square instead of rounded like it is when the page loads.

akcreekon Show HN: Simple aggregator that scrapes hotels, hotwire, airbnb, jetsetter, etc.

I have no suggestions on sites that should be added… I don't really follow that space.

akcreekon Show HN: Simple aggregator that scrapes hotels, hotwire, airbnb, jetsetter, etc.

I think this is fantastic! A few things from a few minutes of poking around:

When you hover on the image for each place the cursor turns to a pointer hand and an image icon overlay appears, but it is not actually clickable.

What is the deal with the "amazing" tab? When looking at places in Louisville, KY two hostels from India are all that show up in that tab.

If you set a filter that has no results the "loading results…" spins forever rather than saying "no results, loosen your filters".

The address/landmark box automatically clears itself if you click back into it. So if I enter an address and nothing comes up and I want to click back in there to edit that address it clears and I have to start over. The search by name box doesn't behave that way so I'm guessing it has something to do with the live search.

When you click the "price on X other sites" link the styles need adjusting. When the line drops down and you are hovered on the block the box shadow cuts right through the newly visible links.

akcreekon Obamacare could help fuel a tech start-up boom

Same here. I'm self employed and my wife is stay at home. I went to anthem.com and signed up for a policy. I'm 29 and she is 27. It costs us $239/mo in Los Angeles.

I've been self employed since getting off my parents insurance, have always had health insurance and never had trouble getting a policy.

akcreekon Tell HN: Startup school acceptance emails are out

Just got my invite and am thrilled. My 30th birthday is the day after so I guess I'll be spending it in SF!

akcreekon Show HN: A drum machine built with Ember.js

That's quite fun. I might be using it incorrectly, but when I add a new channel it sometimes adds multiple rows and it is tied to a previously created channel. The hits are already there and if I turn one off on the new channel it does the same on the previously created channel as well.

akcreekon Show HN: My First Side Project is Live

>Clicking through to get a quote, the site seems merely like a referral site (just an aggregation of links to other sites by area code) -- are you considering adding any price-showing features?

At the moment I'm using a company called surehits to provide the listings, and the info they provide is very basic. I do have plans to create a far more interesting platform for connecting customers and insurers, but I decided to keep it very simple to begin with and take the project in steps. My day job keeps me busy so I didn't want to bite off too much for this side project. I've started a few other projects in the past that I didn't finish and I didn't want to do that again.

I do like and appreciate your suggestions and have copied them down - thanks!