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Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

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Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#291

Post by newbie789 »

vanshg wrote: post #273
newbie789 wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

5 is the most important because without a reasonable revenue model, selling to a larger company and washing your hands of your privacy promises is the clearest way to make money later. Edit: you guys didn’t buy you.com from anybody? The domain “you.com” was up for grabs and you guys bought it for $10 on godaddy? Edit 2: Thanks for answering 3a in the affirmative :). Yes, this is funded by folks that have made million…

He got it from Marc Benioff, who purchased in 1996. I'm assuming as a favor or private transaction, given that Richard and Marc know each other (from Salesforce) and the seed round. https://www.protocol.com/you-dot-com-benioff

Fair enough. Instead of signing a big check for an incredibly valuable domain, Benioff transferred the incredibly valuable domain from his personal possession to the company.

I’m not personally of the opinion that this is an important enough distinction to avoid talking about my larger point of “This is an expensive endeavor and there is no reason to believe that there is any barrier preventing an exit that involves compromising in the event that Marc Benioff or the other investors at some point want their money back.”

Even if the domain was “free”, the rest of the endeavor is incredibly costly. I’m not really filled with confidence that the founder here either straight up didn’t understand the spirit of my point, or found it advantageous to feign ignorance about this.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#293

Post by 16bytes »

Hi Richard,

This is neat work. Regarding the extension requirement, you state that you believe that it's impossible to compete without the convenience of navbar search, aka against Google/Chrome. You may be right, but this thread should demonstrate how highly polarizing that choice is for your users.

Two notes:

* Your competition space is much bigger than just Google. As a privacy browser, you compete against DDG. They actively remove friction. Right now they are a better product. There are more competitors still.

* If your focus is on general search your product isn't as good as Google right now.

It sounds like there are some neat ideas here with summarization and "apps" targeted towards niches like developers, but it's simply not a drop in replacement people are going to use as their daily driver.

It's OK to moon-shot and becoming the next big general search engine certainly qualifies. If I were on your board, I'd tell you to compete against products, not the market positions. I'd tell you not to alienate potential users. Don't draw a box around yourself and say "I want to break the Google monopoly", innovate and you won't have to.

Or focus on your niche, land it and expand.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#294

Post by bryans »

m-i-l wrote: post #88
jasonpeacock wrote: post #11

If it's free for users, then that usually means you're selling user data to create income. How is You making money without Ads and without selling user data?

According to https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/you-com-523e they have received $20M in funding, so as long as they have a sensible burn rate, they could last for years before having to think about how to make a profit. Although the projects that don't have a plan at the outset always seem to either turn bad or fail.

The OP even admitted he hasn't given any thought to monetization, which almost certainly means that this is another dime-a-dozen startup with a built-in exit strategy. The fact that his primary value proposition is that You isn't Google, is a telltale sign that this is destined to join Color in the annals of startup failures.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#295

Post by xupybd »

richardsocher wrote: post #268
ohyeshedid wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Respectfully: because nobody knows who the fuck you are, and your reasoning doesn't make sense. You want to offer a privacy focused search service, but the users need to install an extension because otherwise instead of just having a regular web frontend for the masses to try. Then it's too hard for lusers to switch; you created this problem for yourself. The more you respond, the more it looks like this is some poor…

I get it. There are tons of sketchy extensions. We'll open source our extension so you can see the entire 33kB that's needed to make one settings change. Also, you can try it out in incognito mode or change those settings manually and hence give it a try :) But most people need the simplicity and convenience of a few clicks in order to give it a proper try.

What about changing devices. I'm not going to install an extension to search when I have Google at hand on my phone.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#296

Post by jccalhoun »

lunch wrote: post #97
jccalhoun wrote: post #35

I will give it credit for working on firefox with javascript turned off.

I get a blank page in Firefox with JavaScript turned off :( Content Security Policy: The page’s settings blocked the loading of a resource at inline (“script-src”). Loading failed for the with source “https://you.com/cdn-cgi/scripts/7d0fa10a/cloudflare-static/rocket-loader.min.js”.

I swear it worked for me earlier but now it doesn't. weird.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#297

Post by jccalhoun »

kickling wrote: post #231
jccalhoun wrote: post #35

I will give it credit for working on firefox with javascript turned off.

I only get a blank page as well when changing to javascript.enabled = false

I swear it worked for me earlier. Now it is a blank page.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#298

Post by Matthias1 »

richardsocher wrote: post #236
Matthias1 wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, the fact that all your extension does is change the setting is worse, not better. It's purely a user-hostile choice.

yea.. why? the truth is that most users have no other easily accessible way for them to switch away from a monopoly that sells them, their data and privacy to the highest bidder and requires all companies to pay a tax to exist in the online economy... if you are an expert, you can change your settings manually and hence not require the extension.

Sorry, I went to make a search without the extension installed (because I did try) and I got hit with a full screen error message saying I needed to install the extension.

My mistake was obviously typing in the search bar at the top of the screen. I should have edited the address in the address bar manually. If you don’t have the extension installed, the search bar serves only to take you to an ad to install it.

A UI element that appear to be a search box but is actually an ad for your extension, I would characterize as user hostile design.

Google’s practices, if you don’t agree with them, doesn’t mean that you can do whatever you want because you’re the little guy. Offering an extension is fine. But disabling searching if the extension isn’t installed is not helpful.

Re: Show HN: You.com, private search engine that summarizes the web – built for devs

#299

Post by VWWHFSfQ »

bigwavedave wrote: post #284

Just to be sure we're on the same page here: * You're pitching this search engine specifically "for devs". * You're pitching it on HN, a community which (correct me if I'm wrong, @dang) is largely composed of your target audience. * When given feedback, you're responding very defensively in almost 100% of your comments with something akin to "an extension takes 5s to install and uninstall, just do it, no one cares, w…

This guy is going to blow the 20 mil trying to get people to download his browser extension instead of actually making a search engine or whatever it's supposed to be
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