seancoughlin

this is great feedback. right now, as churches join, we're collecting a version of every data point you mention. soon, search will begin evolving into more of a personality based matching service.

Sean from @FaithStreet here. We're focused on Christianity because its a big market (1m+ Christian communities, 60 million people actively involved in Christian communities) that we're passionately involved in, and we think it would be much harder (for branding, for user acquisition, for product design) to approach multiple faiths simultaneously.

For now, churches create free profiles. We're rolling out paid features for churches soon.

Grocery spending versus restaurant/ deli spending stands out to me: 8.6% on Groceries vs. 5.7% on some version of eating out.

In a better scenario, groceries, being cheaper and generally healthier than food "eaten out" would make up a bigger percentage of total food spend.

That said, as a 20something single guy, I don't remember the last time I went to a grocery store and i think i manage my money pretty well.

I'd like to see these food spend #s (and the rest of these #s) broken down for income levels and other demographics

been in the situation of working for terrible managers in a big company, was 24, working at a top 3 nyc law firm - quit after less than a yr - started working on the startup i'm applying to yc with for summer 2012, trying to innovate in a wide-open, extremely under-served space: Christianity

bravo to this post.

We submitted! Stoked.

I'm impressed by 42Floors and Your Mechanic. I like that each company identified an area full of inefficient orthodoxy and innovated - like AirBnb. 42 Floors also seems to have an especially strong team (Flightcaster) and has a slick design.

Yeah, the unequal bargaining power between the company and the candidate is a real problem. Even if the company makes providing the access information optional, there's still a kind of invasive coercion happening.

That said, companies have been requiring that applicants submit credit reports for a long time, so the idea that there's a bright line between what's "private" and what's "public" when it comes to employment isn't quite right.

I hear that. However, the thrust of the article and the focus of my comment is about new grads, people in going through the recruitment -> internship -> job offer cycle

Second that. I lived for a year in Manhattan (East Village) while working on my start-up - I had roommates, but I made well under 75k and was just fine. Was still able to do all the things a 25 yr old guy wanted to do. The idea that it takes $75k+ to make it work in Manhattan is a farce perpetuated by big banks selling shitty jobs to naive grads and people who don't know how to budget/ be thrifty on message boards.

Most important part of the system the article describes: "We use the summer to decide if we want them full-time. So we give them real work. Hard work."

Too many summer internships (see big law, big finance, etc) fail to give employers the information they need to know if there's a fit, and, just as importantly, fail to give top students the information that THEY need to know if this is where they want to spend 70 hours a week for the next 1-3 years.

One important difference that the author doesn't mention is that after a start-up launch you're still going to be testing hypothesis, making improvements/ changes/ pivots such that your product 6 months after launch might not look anything like your product at launch. With a book, you might add more to a new edition, but the product is more or less set after post-release.

Still, I think it's an interesting post - especially about how writers can learn from iterative/ lean methods. Thanks for sharing!

i dig how you changed the cancellation process, because it encourages ppl to do what your app is intended to do - get groups of 3 together in real life. your old policy was giving incentives for your core mission NOT to happen. i wonder how your service plans to thrive in nyc, where a similar service - ignighter - had to go to india to really succeed. would love to hear your thoughts.

This is a neat article about how context shapes perception of self.

This seems right. Users are much less valuable for companies on Facebook b/c of user intent. What Facebook needs to figure out is how to channel higher value users to ads. One fix might be to create a separate search tool that focuses on "stuff" since the main search navigation is useless for finding anything except your friends.

yeah, OpenTable is solid. I have experience in the restaurant industry as well. It does a very good job of mimicking the most efficient offline systems. Good software designers have to understand the real world experience of a problem to address it well.