I got halfway down the page, to the part where he appears to have picked a bug tracker project at random to call "me-too" and compare to a "Pascal for Dummies" exercise (there's a Pascal book somewhere that mentions Twitter? there's a high school that still teaches Pascal?) --- and started asking how something like this had managed to make it to Svbtle.
Then I realized, "oh, it's wp-svbtle, whatever the fuck that is".
This is a design whose entire purpose is to mimic the Svbtle blog network and confuse readers. Every design choice in it, from the duplication of Curtis' (pointless) "Kudos" thingy to the stroke width of the rules, is made not for its own sake but to duplicate the branding of someone else's site.
It's a jerk move all around, not just to Curtis, or to anyone else who has decided to write for Curtis' network, but to readers, who deserve to know at a glance who an author is, or in this case isn't, affiliated with or endorsed by. And because it's an irritatingly obvious jerk move, it does a disservice to the author as well, making their words a sideshow on their own site.
>mimic the Svbtle blog network and confuse readers
Good, because a "blog network" which is essentially a bunch of blogs with the same look has all the utility of a designer clothing label. Or maybe there is some useful aspect of blogs wearing exclusive uniforms that I'm missing?
I don't need another social network. I don't need ads removed from my current social feed. I don't need app.net.
If twitter died tomorrow something else would pop up. That's the nature of the space. We don't need it and so we go where there is less friction. Ease of use, ease of joining, and ease of finding those I care about most. That's all that matters.
I see App.net becoming something much like svbtle. A highly curated space much like a country club where only those willing to pay the entry fee are allowed in.
Cool.
As long as the data is available publicly through feeds and other api's it won't matter too much. It's still blogging, it's still tweeting, but now your participants have been restricted. Not as much as Svbtle but enough to encourage a certain atmosphere.
> Once those two companies get their act together and improve their developer programs, the market will quickly loose interest in App.net.
isn't the point that Twitter and Facebook's shitty developer relations are a symptom of their desire to monetise and therefore there is never going to be a time when they have good developer relations?
If your senior high school computer science final project wasn’t building an issue tracker or Twitter clone, then your high school either a) didn’t offer computer science classes or b) you were a jock and didn’t take computer science.
I think this is the first time I've actually been filled with hatred towards a blog post.
Dalton has managed to convince 8000 developers to cough up cash. He's got a working alpha with a high level of community engagement. Those are substantial accomplishments.
God... what? First off, which Pascal textbook would be both old enough to include a floppy disk, yet new enough to include a Twitter clone? I simply don't understand his main argument. App.net will be unsuccessful because it's just a clone of Twitter and people won't support a Twitter clone? App.net is certainly not and will not be a Twitter clone, and anyone who has spent more than five minutes looking at the platform, its roadmap, its API docs, etc., would know that.
Regardless of your opinions on whether or not app.net is a worthwhile endeavor, I think Dalton is proving that the "pay for service" business model still does exist and can be applied to internet services. For so long, the norm was "build service people use for free, get a million users, figure out business model" which inevitably leads to a) selling user info or b) targeting people with ads.
Constantly trashing app.net is not seeing the bigger picture. Thankfully, people like Dalton aren't as short-sighted.
Yeah, I would love for something like App.net to succeed, but unfortunately it probably will not. Even if every developer supported it, its the consumers who always have the last word. Consumers outnumber developers by at least 500:1, and 99 percent of consumers do not care about the issues that developers face. If you don't get consumers (i.e. non-developers) on your platform, it will die (unless of course you are building B2B tools or something).
There isn't really any useful content in that rant to comment about, so I'm going to go off topic a little bit:
"If your senior high school computer science final project wasn’t building an issue tracker or Twitter clone, then your high school either a) didn’t offer computer science classes or b) you were a jock and didn’t take computer science."
Is this really true? My brain immediately turned off when I read this, but then I realized I have no clue what people in high school usually program.
I'll go first: around 14 or 15 I wrote a bytecode compiler for some god awful language that looked like the bastard child of Perl and Javascript... I guess around late high school time I was mainly working on Smogon, a competitive Pokemon website (still around and making money!) and NetBattle, an online simulator for several Pokemon generations (now defunct and replaced by www.pokemonshowdown.com)
So HN, what was your "senior high school project"?
You can't compare something that requires a critical mass to be useful (app.net, Facebook, Twitter) with issue tracking software.
B2B products, like bug trackers, can carve a niche and do rather well with just a few hundred or thousand paid customers. Yes, they're not going to all be Atlassian, but a solo founder charging 1,000 people $30 a month can live very comfortably. And you can drift along for a while and not ultimately give up because "the big guys" are 1000x your size.
B2C products, like app.net, exist on an entirely different plane.
Disclaimer: I run a fairly new project management tool / bug tracker that already has already replaced a considerable amount of my monthly income.
Twitter was crap when it started, something happened which caused it to be useful. App.net is crap, but maybe something useful will come out of it and then we'll find it useful.
What is svbtle in the first place (never even heard of it, and I bet 99% of people haven't either)? Is it a theme? I have no clue why this needs to be mentioned. WHy not just criticize his words?
[+] [-] tptacek|13 years ago|reply
I got halfway down the page, to the part where he appears to have picked a bug tracker project at random to call "me-too" and compare to a "Pascal for Dummies" exercise (there's a Pascal book somewhere that mentions Twitter? there's a high school that still teaches Pascal?) --- and started asking how something like this had managed to make it to Svbtle.
Then I realized, "oh, it's wp-svbtle, whatever the fuck that is".
This is a design whose entire purpose is to mimic the Svbtle blog network and confuse readers. Every design choice in it, from the duplication of Curtis' (pointless) "Kudos" thingy to the stroke width of the rules, is made not for its own sake but to duplicate the branding of someone else's site.
It's a jerk move all around, not just to Curtis, or to anyone else who has decided to write for Curtis' network, but to readers, who deserve to know at a glance who an author is, or in this case isn't, affiliated with or endorsed by. And because it's an irritatingly obvious jerk move, it does a disservice to the author as well, making their words a sideshow on their own site.
[+] [-] dcurtis|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mcantelon|13 years ago|reply
Good, because a "blog network" which is essentially a bunch of blogs with the same look has all the utility of a designer clothing label. Or maybe there is some useful aspect of blogs wearing exclusive uniforms that I'm missing?
[+] [-] taterbase|13 years ago|reply
I don't need another social network. I don't need ads removed from my current social feed. I don't need app.net.
If twitter died tomorrow something else would pop up. That's the nature of the space. We don't need it and so we go where there is less friction. Ease of use, ease of joining, and ease of finding those I care about most. That's all that matters.
I see App.net becoming something much like svbtle. A highly curated space much like a country club where only those willing to pay the entry fee are allowed in.
Cool.
As long as the data is available publicly through feeds and other api's it won't matter too much. It's still blogging, it's still tweeting, but now your participants have been restricted. Not as much as Svbtle but enough to encourage a certain atmosphere.
[+] [-] ninetax|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] citricsquid|13 years ago|reply
isn't the point that Twitter and Facebook's shitty developer relations are a symptom of their desire to monetise and therefore there is never going to be a time when they have good developer relations?
[+] [-] MiguelHudnandez|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jmduke|13 years ago|reply
I think this is the first time I've actually been filled with hatred towards a blog post.
[+] [-] tarr11|13 years ago|reply
I wouldn't write it off just yet.
[+] [-] cmelbye|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] darkpicnic|13 years ago|reply
Constantly trashing app.net is not seeing the bigger picture. Thankfully, people like Dalton aren't as short-sighted.
[+] [-] gavanwoolery|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chrismonsanto|13 years ago|reply
"If your senior high school computer science final project wasn’t building an issue tracker or Twitter clone, then your high school either a) didn’t offer computer science classes or b) you were a jock and didn’t take computer science."
Is this really true? My brain immediately turned off when I read this, but then I realized I have no clue what people in high school usually program.
I'll go first: around 14 or 15 I wrote a bytecode compiler for some god awful language that looked like the bastard child of Perl and Javascript... I guess around late high school time I was mainly working on Smogon, a competitive Pokemon website (still around and making money!) and NetBattle, an online simulator for several Pokemon generations (now defunct and replaced by www.pokemonshowdown.com)
So HN, what was your "senior high school project"?
[+] [-] bdunn|13 years ago|reply
B2B products, like bug trackers, can carve a niche and do rather well with just a few hundred or thousand paid customers. Yes, they're not going to all be Atlassian, but a solo founder charging 1,000 people $30 a month can live very comfortably. And you can drift along for a while and not ultimately give up because "the big guys" are 1000x your size.
B2C products, like app.net, exist on an entirely different plane.
Disclaimer: I run a fairly new project management tool / bug tracker that already has already replaced a considerable amount of my monthly income.
[+] [-] jagira|13 years ago|reply
App.net, from where I see, looks like a platform with more developers than users.
[+] [-] pmarsh|13 years ago|reply
Would it be great if App.net flourishes to the point of being a continued relevant tool and site for years? Of course.
But its goals are worth keeping track of and working towards. No need to get so worked up about it against it.
[+] [-] Irishsteve|13 years ago|reply
p.s I'm in the app.net alpha.
[+] [-] iamdann|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wilfra|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] StavrosK|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AznHisoka|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] astrojams|13 years ago|reply