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Ask HN: Do you put a smiley photo of yourself on your app's About page?

10 points| boggles | 16 years ago | reply

I'm wondering what to put on the About page of my app. I'm debating whether to put up a friendly looking smiling photo of myself. As much as I'm a private person, I feel that my app requires that I indentify myself personally with it. Any tips for how to do this?

17 comments

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[+] edw519|16 years ago|reply
In case you want to maintain your privacy, do what I did...

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   \/ \      |_|      / \/
       \             /
        \  \-----/  /
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[+] tptacek|16 years ago|reply
Get a haircut!
[+] unalone|16 years ago|reply
This is why you teach yourself to have a distinct writing style. It gives you the personality and the privacy.

When I launched a site in February with a friend, we got a lot of email feedback complimenting us directly for our About page, which had snippets like "Rory is pretty much certainly a douche" strewn about it. We also asked for feedback haiku, and received so much we couldn't post all of it online. All that without a single personal tidbit about either of us.

[+] Travis|16 years ago|reply
There is some research to show that a "real world feel" is a critical component of a website (from the "What makes a website credible" study from a few years back. Having a picture of you will go some ways towards doing that. I put my pic on my website.

If you do this, please make sure to put a good pic up -- no self-taken camera phone bluriness, please. Remember, you want to personalize the experience but still seem professional.

[+] herrherr|16 years ago|reply
Looking at the analytics of all the websites I have build (50+) the most visited page is always the "team" or "about" page. So there seems to be a desire for getting to know the people behind the company name. Yet this doesn't prove that it is a good idea ... just saying :-)
[+] JangoSteve|16 years ago|reply
It's hard to give a definite answer without knowing who your target market is or who you are. If you are a B2C, connecting personally is good, everyone loves the underdog startup. If you are a B2B, it may be difficult to land large contracts with that sort of persona.
[+] hopeless|16 years ago|reply
Nope, it's everything except my face. Cameras are great for hiding behind ;-)

http://www.shutterscouts.com/about.html

[+] pbhjpbhj|16 years ago|reply
Just a fwiw. Your idea sounds like a good one but your features page is a bit lacking. You give images of other things but no images of your app, I couldn't even see if it's browser based or downloadable, nor what platform I need to run it off.

Your homepage mentions SMS, your features page doesn't.

I'm thinking it's something along the lines of a map based system where locations for future shoots are tagged, probably with some sample images as reminders + details of the conditions I'm looking for. Then there must be a calendar view showing any likely conditions matches and giving me a list of possible shoots? Plenty there for some more visuals. You've avoided overuse of text but the imagery (whilst lush) doesn't aid my understanding of your offering and isn't helping to lead me to sign up. Is it free?

Oh, apologies I tried "sign up" - you should label the website as a preview or state "sign up by email" if that's what you want folk to do. A great start, best.

[+] tptacek|16 years ago|reply
If you are one person, no. Don't promote the fact that you're a one-person shop.

If you're multiple people, plenty of startups (Kayak and Meebo come to mind) put pictures up.

[+] fjabre|16 years ago|reply
There are some people who won't like it. I guess it depends on the type of marketing you're doing.. but I'd have a hard time buying an iPhone is I saw Jobs' face on the back.
[+] joeythibault|16 years ago|reply
Nothing wrong with adding personality to your site. I don't think it will detract or add anything to it, unless you're either a supermodel or the fly.