Thinking that sync is optional is a really weird thing that seems to linger in the Apple world.
You know the old William Gibson line that cyberspace is the place where telephone conversations happen? Not in the hardware at either end, but in the "space between"? Computing has moved there too.
Work used to happen on a device and then was transferred to other devices, either manually (floppies, email) or later automatically (sync, dropbox). Thanks to the web, mobile devices and lots of data, that's changed: Google Apps led the way, but Evernote etc all let you do your work in the space between devices.
Nowadays, putting the device first over the data (or ignoring other devices entirely, like this app does) is like putting the phone first over the call: beautiful, elegant hardware, refined way to dial, custom typeface for the numbers ... but you can't call anyone with it.
Apple in particular makes this mistake repeatedly. Photostream is device-first, so you have to work out what the hell is where and work out what you want to download to which machine. iTunes Match is device-first, so you're forever downloading and deleting tracks to make space on a particular device. Me.com tries to keep the sync truth on one of your devices, so conflicts abound. Notifications appear on all devices and often have to be dismissed individually on each of them. They see the world through the device first.
I suppose it's obvious why it happens -- they're a hardware company, and they grew up in a pre-networked world -- but I think misunderstanding this is one key reason they're seen as "bad at services" in comparison to Google, which is instinctively and entirely in "the space between devices".
As for this app, why would I ever want to be trapped in a single place again? They might as well have made it for an SE/30.
DF has posted quite a number of links over the last couple of months, highlighting how poor sync on iOS currently is (iCloud in particular). I'm pretty sure Brett Simmons has posted quite a few of them too... My theory is they tried to get sync working in as polished a fashion as they wanted, it didn't work well enough, so they dropped it for v1. If Apple fixes iCloud sync at WWDC they'll add it back in a new version. If not, they can just say it's not something they feel the app needs.
I find sync that requires an account a negative factor. There are many notes I wouldn't want to share with Google.
Also as soon as you offer sync you need to have a conflict resolution approach and there is no way to always resolve in a clean way without user intervention.
This app Isn't For You. Sync is great if you want it, or have a need for it, but the majority of iOS users currently have a singular device, so why invest time and resources into a feature a lot of people won't need? Why not just focus on a majority share?
Yes you're trapped, but think of it as being stuck on a desert island happily, rather than being jailed unwillingly.
Edit: I'll rephrase singular as singular device with an Apple provided operating system.
I'm not sure I'm understanding the point of this tool. It looks trendy, but it takes notes. No syncing. I mean, this is the guy that wrote NetNewsWire. Wouldn't an app like this be doable in a weekend?
I honestly want to find something new that the app does that is supposed to change my workflow, but there is just nothing. A cynical part of me feels like this exists (especially with the $5 price tag) just to ride the fame coattails of Gruber+Simmons+Wiskus.
I don't condemn them for taking the opportunity of their current notoriety. I'm coming off of week 4 of an app launch that completely failed to garner any reviews or growth, so it does really hurt to see reviews of this app that are nearly 4,000 words long: http://www.macstories.net/reviews/vesper-review-collect-your...
Paul Graham, I know you can hear me, and I know this is possible because I know a thing or two about the Javascripts, and so I'm telling you now: the site's banner should strobe clown colors for 5 minutes every time news.arc sees this string.
I feel your pain. The truth about getting publicity for apps on major blogs is: you wont get publicity for your app, unless...
- it is visually novel or has some cute gimmick
- there is some story about the people behind the app (already have an audience)
- there is some story/narrative that is only tangentially related to the actual quality of the app
- a massive game changer (incremental improvements aren't going to cut it). Massive game changers dont happen often, and your app most likely isnt one even if it has features that other apps dont.
I've decided to forgo spending much time trying to get major blog/tech site coverage for my apps. It's a wash now - better to build your own audience and market in other ways.
Feel free to email me if you wish to discuss this: krishna @ logiccolony dot com
Seriously, so you aren't aware of that from the beginning?
I'll try to give you a scaled perspective:
1. Announce in your site that you are going to give a speech.
2. Obama announces that he is going to give a speech.
There is high probability that your speech is going to be more interesting, entertaining and informing. However, your viewers are going to be close to 0, and Obama is watched by the entire world and covered by major medias.
It appears to me by purchasing this app, you are trading the features of existing products for a slick design. I'm particularly impressed with how they have spun the lack of features as a feature ("simple and elegant", "imposes no system")
For me, inability to coexist with Notational Velocity is a dealbreaker.
It's just the difference between someone who wants a swiss army knife and someone who wants a santoku knife. They're just two different philosophies of experience design. Calling it "spin" ignores the actual benefits (and tradeoffs) inherent in that design philosophy.
What exactly is the point of this? I mean, what does this app do that's new or exciting or hell, even better than any existing app does? Not to take anything away from the people who made this, but if someone else had made such a simplistic app, with next to no features, and put it out, I doubt anyone would have given it the time of day.
It looks nice. I will give it that, but $5 bucks seems a little much for a notes app that can't sync across platforms as far as I can tell... not even iCloud.
Evernote, Springpad, Simplenote, and even Google Keep for iOS (when it is finally release) have syncing from the get go.
I wish this existed on OS X, and not just iOS, a platform where I'm never particularly interested in taking notes.
What would be especially nice would be if iOS Vesper was a satellite of a desktop Vesper, so that my photos and location information would automatically get pulled into my notes.
It's a journal app, but it has the same features as Vesper, but with sync, a desktop app, and a calendar view of your posts. In my eyes it also has a very similar interface.
Bought it and played around with it a bit. Very nice interface. The app has a very nice initial feel.
However besides the ability to send an email or text, the data appears to only stay the app. There is no DropBox or other syncing options. So it will not replace SimpleNote/nvAlt for me.
Interesting, I expected this to support Markdown. But I do like the simple and automated formatting that is provided.
The fact, that they named the app after the First Bond Girl could indicate that this is a first of group of apps. So maybe the sync'ing features will be coming in later releases.
Unless I'm missing something, this is a direct competitor to Evernote, yes?
I think I get it - Evernote has always been a bit of a mess IMHO and while it's the best of what existed, it seemed overly complicated and cluttered. This appears to be a measured (and flat) response to that.
I don't see anything about Vesper syncing to the cloud, so there's no way it could ever compete with Evernote for me. My notes have not been tied to any one particular device for several years thanks to EN, and there's no way I'm giving that up.
I find the choice of name interesting. I realise it's a Bond reference, but the first impression I got was of an unreliable old moped, not the image I think the developers would want to associate with.
that's a very pretty translation of iOS design principles into a flat UI. makes me wonder in Gruber & friends have seen a sneak peek at the rumoured new flat iOS.
Ugh... another note-taking app. How does this non-innovation make frontpage news at Techmeme and other places? I don't get it.
Make an app that takes notes FOR me, automatically, without me having to even think about it, and I'll pay $5 for that. Seriously, we've been making note-taking apps since the dawn of the text editor. It's a solved problem. Move along.
People who complain about the $5 price tag: How many coffees do you buy per day?
Now, I don't drink coffee (dry eyes issues) and I'm not an app store shopaholic. However, if there is something of interest, I'm not going to complain about the lack of x and y and the high price.
Features: I'm all for simplicity, in the right circumstances. I use Clear from Realmac Software because when I'm creating to-do lists, speed is the most important thing to me. However, when I'm writing notes, accessibility is probably the most important thing for me and that means sync, I'd also bet this is the case for many people, hence the popularity of things like Evernote and Google Keep. The absence of sync from Vesper seems like a massive oversight, and makes me wonder if it's on the cards for a future version, or perhaps for a working iCloud? In addition to sync, I would have thought it would have Markdown support, even if it was transparent to the user in some way and
Price: The price doesn't hugely concern me here. If I find an app truly useful, then $5 is a small price to pay, and I support developers making a bit of a stand on this and charging premium prices for premium products. The feature set isn't one that interests me because of the lack of sync, so whether it was $5 or $1 wouldn't really make a difference for me.
Design: 'flat design' is nice when done well, but detracts from usability when done badly in my opinion. If you have a non-flat design, unless it's hugely over-the-top, I don't think it detracts from the usability. (sidenote, what's the correct terminology for the opposite of 'flat design'? It's certainly not skeumorphic) Lots of Microsoft's 'metro' styling does flat design well, using varying font sizes and typographic and visual hints to provide context to controls, whereas Visual Studio has gone too far and removed far to many visual cues which results in a less usable interface in my experience.
I feel that Vesper goes to far. As there is so little to the app it's hard to justify it being 'less usable', but I do think the interface to be a long way from correctly executed flat design. I think other apps and designs are far closer to how flat design should be.
Another interesting thing to note is the animation on transitioning to a new note. Federico Vittici made a GIF of it (http://bit.ly/15EEKkP) for his review (http://bit.ly/11Hkz16). Federico points out that it makes the interface feel a lot faster to the user, but I don't think it's the right thing to do. Firstly, as I said above, I don't think speed should be a priority for things like this, after all, the amount of time for a 0.5s transition is minuscule to the amount of time spent composing the note. But also it breaks the well known metaphor of the UI stack in iOS. The back button still indicates that it will move to the screen on the left, however the screen hasn't really moved in the user's mind. It's not a crucial point, but it's one of those 'papercuts' (http://askubuntu.com/questions/1006/what-is-a-paper-cut) that I would expect a team such as the one behind this app to have addressed.
I wrote more than I planned to, so I might turn this into a blog post. Would be interested to know peoples thoughts on it first though.
Concerning the sync I think they're waiting to see if Apple plans to fix iCloud (with CoreData) in iOS 7 or if they must look for another way to do the sync. At least this is what I would do, we're very near WWDC I think it was wise to wait to see how it goes. Although I think what's more debatable was the decision to release the app now and not to wait few weeks or even september. Personally I would have tried (if as I think it's for them a side project) to wait the release of iOS 7 (and maybe require iOS 7) and add the sync functionality in version 1.0.
To attempt to answer your question of what is the opposite of flat design: I refer to it simply as detailed and minimalist. Therefore, skeumorphism would be a specific type of detailed design. Flat and minimalist are far more similar but I think flat has a more restrictive meaning. This also allows for the middle grounds of semi-detailed and semi-minimalist.
[+] [-] marbletiles|13 years ago|reply
You know the old William Gibson line that cyberspace is the place where telephone conversations happen? Not in the hardware at either end, but in the "space between"? Computing has moved there too.
Work used to happen on a device and then was transferred to other devices, either manually (floppies, email) or later automatically (sync, dropbox). Thanks to the web, mobile devices and lots of data, that's changed: Google Apps led the way, but Evernote etc all let you do your work in the space between devices.
Nowadays, putting the device first over the data (or ignoring other devices entirely, like this app does) is like putting the phone first over the call: beautiful, elegant hardware, refined way to dial, custom typeface for the numbers ... but you can't call anyone with it.
Apple in particular makes this mistake repeatedly. Photostream is device-first, so you have to work out what the hell is where and work out what you want to download to which machine. iTunes Match is device-first, so you're forever downloading and deleting tracks to make space on a particular device. Me.com tries to keep the sync truth on one of your devices, so conflicts abound. Notifications appear on all devices and often have to be dismissed individually on each of them. They see the world through the device first.
I suppose it's obvious why it happens -- they're a hardware company, and they grew up in a pre-networked world -- but I think misunderstanding this is one key reason they're seen as "bad at services" in comparison to Google, which is instinctively and entirely in "the space between devices".
As for this app, why would I ever want to be trapped in a single place again? They might as well have made it for an SE/30.
[+] [-] __chrismc|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] josephlord|13 years ago|reply
Also as soon as you offer sync you need to have a conflict resolution approach and there is no way to always resolve in a clean way without user intervention.
[+] [-] nicholassmith|13 years ago|reply
Yes you're trapped, but think of it as being stuck on a desert island happily, rather than being jailed unwillingly.
Edit: I'll rephrase singular as singular device with an Apple provided operating system.
[+] [-] state|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] monkey_slap|13 years ago|reply
I honestly want to find something new that the app does that is supposed to change my workflow, but there is just nothing. A cynical part of me feels like this exists (especially with the $5 price tag) just to ride the fame coattails of Gruber+Simmons+Wiskus.
I don't condemn them for taking the opportunity of their current notoriety. I'm coming off of week 4 of an app launch that completely failed to garner any reviews or growth, so it does really hurt to see reviews of this app that are nearly 4,000 words long: http://www.macstories.net/reviews/vesper-review-collect-your...
[+] [-] tptacek|13 years ago|reply
Paul Graham, I know you can hear me, and I know this is possible because I know a thing or two about the Javascripts, and so I'm telling you now: the site's banner should strobe clown colors for 5 minutes every time news.arc sees this string.
[+] [-] kenshi|13 years ago|reply
- it is visually novel or has some cute gimmick
- there is some story about the people behind the app (already have an audience)
- there is some story/narrative that is only tangentially related to the actual quality of the app
- a massive game changer (incremental improvements aren't going to cut it). Massive game changers dont happen often, and your app most likely isnt one even if it has features that other apps dont.
I've decided to forgo spending much time trying to get major blog/tech site coverage for my apps. It's a wash now - better to build your own audience and market in other ways.
Feel free to email me if you wish to discuss this: krishna @ logiccolony dot com
[+] [-] csomar|13 years ago|reply
I'll try to give you a scaled perspective:
1. Announce in your site that you are going to give a speech.
2. Obama announces that he is going to give a speech.
There is high probability that your speech is going to be more interesting, entertaining and informing. However, your viewers are going to be close to 0, and Obama is watched by the entire world and covered by major medias.
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] smackfu|13 years ago|reply
http://www.macworld.com/article/2032847/a-5-app-isnt-expensi...
[+] [-] tptacek|13 years ago|reply
http://daringfireball.net/2006/11/pinprick
(Where by "or" I mean "no").
[+] [-] jmduke|13 years ago|reply
For me, inability to coexist with Notational Velocity is a dealbreaker.
[+] [-] tptacek|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] woolb|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] montagg|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fakeer|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] manish_gill|13 years ago|reply
This is app.net all over again.
[+] [-] pazimzadeh|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alexcroox|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pseudometa|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ph33r|13 years ago|reply
Evernote, Springpad, Simplenote, and even Google Keep for iOS (when it is finally release) have syncing from the get go.
[+] [-] ramykhuffash|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smackfu|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tptacek|13 years ago|reply
What would be especially nice would be if iOS Vesper was a satellite of a desktop Vesper, so that my photos and location information would automatically get pulled into my notes.
[+] [-] rdouble|13 years ago|reply
It's a journal app, but it has the same features as Vesper, but with sync, a desktop app, and a calendar view of your posts. In my eyes it also has a very similar interface.
[+] [-] samtp|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kloncks|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] youngerdryas|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leejoramo|13 years ago|reply
However besides the ability to send an email or text, the data appears to only stay the app. There is no DropBox or other syncing options. So it will not replace SimpleNote/nvAlt for me.
Interesting, I expected this to support Markdown. But I do like the simple and automated formatting that is provided.
[+] [-] leejoramo|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nlh|13 years ago|reply
I think I get it - Evernote has always been a bit of a mess IMHO and while it's the best of what existed, it seemed overly complicated and cluttered. This appears to be a measured (and flat) response to that.
[+] [-] egypturnash|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] jckt|13 years ago|reply
Does look nice, though, I'll give Vesper that.
[+] [-] marcosscriven|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danpalmer|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] slaven|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ryandvm|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] notatoad|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] antidaily|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lonster|13 years ago|reply
Make an app that takes notes FOR me, automatically, without me having to even think about it, and I'll pay $5 for that. Seriously, we've been making note-taking apps since the dawn of the text editor. It's a solved problem. Move along.
[+] [-] csomar|13 years ago|reply
Now, I don't drink coffee (dry eyes issues) and I'm not an app store shopaholic. However, if there is something of interest, I'm not going to complain about the lack of x and y and the high price.
The price is already too low.
[+] [-] danpalmer|13 years ago|reply
Price: The price doesn't hugely concern me here. If I find an app truly useful, then $5 is a small price to pay, and I support developers making a bit of a stand on this and charging premium prices for premium products. The feature set isn't one that interests me because of the lack of sync, so whether it was $5 or $1 wouldn't really make a difference for me.
Design: 'flat design' is nice when done well, but detracts from usability when done badly in my opinion. If you have a non-flat design, unless it's hugely over-the-top, I don't think it detracts from the usability. (sidenote, what's the correct terminology for the opposite of 'flat design'? It's certainly not skeumorphic) Lots of Microsoft's 'metro' styling does flat design well, using varying font sizes and typographic and visual hints to provide context to controls, whereas Visual Studio has gone too far and removed far to many visual cues which results in a less usable interface in my experience.
I feel that Vesper goes to far. As there is so little to the app it's hard to justify it being 'less usable', but I do think the interface to be a long way from correctly executed flat design. I think other apps and designs are far closer to how flat design should be.
Another interesting thing to note is the animation on transitioning to a new note. Federico Vittici made a GIF of it (http://bit.ly/15EEKkP) for his review (http://bit.ly/11Hkz16). Federico points out that it makes the interface feel a lot faster to the user, but I don't think it's the right thing to do. Firstly, as I said above, I don't think speed should be a priority for things like this, after all, the amount of time for a 0.5s transition is minuscule to the amount of time spent composing the note. But also it breaks the well known metaphor of the UI stack in iOS. The back button still indicates that it will move to the screen on the left, however the screen hasn't really moved in the user's mind. It's not a crucial point, but it's one of those 'papercuts' (http://askubuntu.com/questions/1006/what-is-a-paper-cut) that I would expect a team such as the one behind this app to have addressed.
I wrote more than I planned to, so I might turn this into a blog post. Would be interested to know peoples thoughts on it first though.
[+] [-] doe88|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ktrgardiner|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] panacea|13 years ago|reply