Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99 • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#11

Post by traviswingo » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 8:59 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #9

traviswingo wrote: post #7

This is a full rework of my original project, Postacard.io. The entire project has been completely rewritten. The new version includes a Messenger bot for international use without the SMS fees, as well as statistical NLP in address parsing for faster creation (from start to finish) and better accuracy internationally. FYI, for those of you using "UK" as your country code. The postcard service this uses recognizes "G…

Amazing work!

Thanks!

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#12

Post by throwanem » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:02 PM UTC

I'd like to use this! But I have questions. Tell me more about the automatic rotation, and in general about how images are fit to cards when the aspect ratio differs. I'm also curious about print resolution.

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#13

Post by traviswingo » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:05 PM UTC

throwanem wrote: post #12

I'd like to use this! But I have questions. Tell me more about the automatic rotation, and in general about how images are fit to cards when the aspect ratio differs. I'm also curious about print resolution.

Well essentially the platform simply looks at the difference between the width and height, and rotates to fit a 4x6 aspect ratio, gravitated towards the center of the photo. It works best with photos taken directly from a smart phone, uncropped. It also scales the resolution if its not high enough, but this typically isn't an issue if the photo was taken with a modern smartphone today.

You can read a bit about this in FAQ

https://postcardbot.co/faq

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#14

Post by traviswingo » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:10 PM UTC

rick_perez wrote: post #4

jonalmeida wrote: post #2

This isn't a new Show HN since you've posted this before[1] with the domain postacard.io. What's changed since then? [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12427505

Well, there is a penny difference in the title. A holiday discount?

Yeah, I'm playing with the pricing model. As a side project, I'd like it to at least break even. The NLP required for parsing addresses uses quite a bit of memory, so this increases the monthly costs to keep it online. Also, sending a postcard outside of the US costs substantially more than within the US. I wanted to find a good pricing structure that's flat, regardless of where the postcard is going.

There's room to reduce these costs as more people use the service. As long as I'm breaking even on servers I'll be happy :).

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#15

Post by wineisfine » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:12 PM UTC

Nice, but you could make it alot more accessible with naming it something friendlier, postcardbuddy, or something and have some "cute" logo. Its quite tech geek bare metal now

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#16

Post by traviswingo » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:14 PM UTC

wineisfine wrote: post #15

Nice, but you could make it alot more accessible with naming it something friendlier, postcardbuddy, or something and have some "cute" logo. Its quite tech geek bare metal now

Good tip! That could be because I'm a bare metal tech geek :p

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#17

Post by yabatopia » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:25 PM UTC

There's somehow a contradiction between the service you're offering and the name of the service. Postcard BOT feels impersonal, cold and automated, while you associate a postcard with something warm, handwritten, personal. There's a risk that your target market (postcard lovers) might get turned off by the name (bot).

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#18

Post by biot » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:27 PM UTC

wineisfine wrote: post #15

Nice, but you could make it alot more accessible with naming it something friendlier, postcardbuddy, or something and have some "cute" logo. Its quite tech geek bare metal now

AI and bots are all the rage right now. The word "buddy" is associated with all sorts of malware [0]. I'd say postcardbot is a great name, particularly as the Facebook Messenger implementation actually is a bot.

[0] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=buddy+malware&t=h_&ia=web

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#19

Post by traviswingo » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:29 PM UTC

yabatopia wrote: post #17

There's somehow a contradiction between the service you're offering and the name of the service. Postcard BOT feels impersonal, cold and automated, while you associate a postcard with something warm, handwritten, personal. There's a risk that your target market (postcard lovers) might get turned off by the name (bot).

Thanks for the tip :). I honestly didn't take that into consideration when naming the project. I'll see what I can do and if it's worth the extra effort :).

Re: Show HN: Send a Custom Postcard to Anywhere, from Your Phone, for $2.99

#20

Post by fpgaminer » Sat, Dec 31, 2016, 9:46 PM UTC

wineisfine wrote: post #15

Nice, but you could make it alot more accessible with naming it something friendlier, postcardbuddy, or something and have some "cute" logo. Its quite tech geek bare metal now

I've read and analyzed a large number of stories on IndieHackers and not a single one mentioned the name being an issue, or something they wished they had changed.

There probably are a few stories out there of companies rebranding successfully and meaningfully, but it doesn't seem to matter that much in the general case.