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Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

slapastory.com

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Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#21

Post by sbarski »

marketer wrote: post #17

I have a couple comments on the UGC aspects of this site. I honestly don't know how large the 'story' market is, but I've had some experience with UGC sites. 1. You expect a LOT from your users. Writing a story takes a long, long time. It's much less difficult than pressing an up button or making a quick edit. Why will people want to submit stories to the site? Are any of you prolific story writers? 2. Your people ar…

You are right. Writing is a lengthy and demanding process.

We do need to market this properly and find people who are interested in writing stories.

Going by the amount of blogs/literary sites and forums that are out there - we reckon that these people do exist in certain numbers. We just have to find find and convince them that our platform is right for them.

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#22

Post by Ilia »

SwellJoe wrote: post #15

I question whether this is a "startup" or a "hobby with a small revenue stream". The site looks nice, no doubt about that...I think you've executed well (aside from some typos--"sing up" on the story page under the comment box, for example), so I'm not saying you're building an amateurish site. Just that I can't imagine how this can make enough money to support more than one or two people. I could, of course, be wron…

You are right, at the moment we are trying to build a mini community of writers. Mostly this was a request from a few friends of mine that are avid writers. We just want to see how far this can go. Any exposure for them is good. Maybe we can even get publishers on board.

You never know until you try it.

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#23

Post by [deleted] »

rksprst wrote: post #18

I like your idea. However, I don't like the fact that simply by submitting something I automatically grant you a license to do whatever you want with it. In fact, I was going to submit a short story but will not after reading your terms and conditions. I think that to make the site successful you need high quality stories that people want to read and vote up. I am not sure that authors would be willing to post on you…

[deleted]

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#24

Post by sbarski »

rksprst wrote: post #18

I like your idea. However, I don't like the fact that simply by submitting something I automatically grant you a license to do whatever you want with it. In fact, I was going to submit a short story but will not after reading your terms and conditions. I think that to make the site successful you need high quality stories that people want to read and vote up. I am not sure that authors would be willing to post on you…

If you read the last paragraph in our T&C you will see that we do not assert any ownership over your content (story). It still belongs to you and you can do with it whatever you like.

What we want, however, is to be able to use user-submitted content for any possible advertising or promotion purposes. This is kind of what facebook does except not as evil. We reckon that the user will benefit from this too (as it will show off his story to more people if we link to it in an ad).

We will make all of that clearer in our T&C. Thank you!

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#26

Post by unalone »

"Slap a Story is a place for people like you and I; for people who like to read and write."

Change to:

"Slap a Story is a place for people like you and me: people who like to read and write."

I mean, writing sites need some self-respect.

I'm a bit anal about writing sites online: I think they're all barking up the wrong tree, yours included. I think that we have places for people who want to write silly texts: forums games are ideal. This site doesn't do anything to solve that. But I'll ignore that and focus on the actual site.

You've got a good text-to-image ratio. No pictures associated with stories. That's good, because I hate sites that think visuals have anything to do with writing.

I don't like how your numbers clip off on the side. I don't know why you need ranking to begin with.

I can't say much more: it's ripping features off of Digg, visual quirks off of several sites, and it has a tag cloud. Beyond the concept, the site has a pretty standard layout. I can't criticize that other than to say that it does nothing whatsoever for me, and it's entirely undistinguished.

Please, though: for the sake of pretending to respect the medium, style your stories up a bit. Make them look nice. Use different line spacing for paragraphs, use a font that actually looks nice. When your medium is text, not doing anything to style text is just silly.

Hope that helps. Feel free to respond if you think I'm being unfair.

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#27

Post by Ilia »

unalone wrote: post #26

"Slap a Story is a place for people like you and I; for people who like to read and write." Change to: "Slap a Story is a place for people like you and me: people who like to read and write." I mean, writing sites need some self-respect. I'm a bit anal about writing sites online: I think they're all barking up the wrong tree, yours included. I think that we have places for people who want to write silly texts: forums…

Firstly, thank you for your honest feedback. Writing sites do need self respect, and this is the reason that we have developed this site. I am personally a developer and an avid reader. Although it may seems like a ripping of Digg - digg doesn't have a fiction category or any sub-categories that we have included. In terms of layout we didn't want to get too creative, but we do want to make it as simple on the eyes as possible - so our priority at the moment is to style the stories.

Again thank you for your feedback.

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#28

Post by unalone »

Ilia wrote: post #27
unalone wrote: post #26

"Slap a Story is a place for people like you and I; for people who like to read and write." Change to: "Slap a Story is a place for people like you and me: people who like to read and write." I mean, writing sites need some self-respect. I'm a bit anal about writing sites online: I think they're all barking up the wrong tree, yours included. I think that we have places for people who want to write silly texts: forums…

Firstly, thank you for your honest feedback. Writing sites do need self respect, and this is the reason that we have developed this site. I am personally a developer and an avid reader. Although it may seems like a ripping of Digg - digg doesn't have a fiction category or any sub-categories that we have included. In terms of layout we didn't want to get too creative, but we do want to make it as simple on the eyes as…

Absolutely. Well, I'm working on a site for writers at the moment, and it focuses on a completely radical angle. When it's done I'll tell you, and I'm hoping you tell me if it's got flaws as well. We writers ought to stick together. :-)

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#29

Post by Ilia »

unalone wrote: post #28
Ilia wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firstly, thank you for your honest feedback. Writing sites do need self respect, and this is the reason that we have developed this site. I am personally a developer and an avid reader. Although it may seems like a ripping of Digg - digg doesn't have a fiction category or any sub-categories that we have included. In terms of layout we didn't want to get too creative, but we do want to make it as simple on the eyes as…

Absolutely. Well, I'm working on a site for writers at the moment, and it focuses on a completely radical angle. When it's done I'll tell you, and I'm hoping you tell me if it's got flaws as well. We writers ought to stick together. :-)

definitely, let me know and I will put your link on my site.

Re: Rate My Startup - Slap A Story

#30

Post by comatose_kid »

sbarski wrote: post #21
marketer wrote: post #17

I have a couple comments on the UGC aspects of this site. I honestly don't know how large the 'story' market is, but I've had some experience with UGC sites. 1. You expect a LOT from your users. Writing a story takes a long, long time. It's much less difficult than pressing an up button or making a quick edit. Why will people want to submit stories to the site? Are any of you prolific story writers? 2. Your people ar…

You are right. Writing is a lengthy and demanding process. We do need to market this properly and find people who are interested in writing stories. Going by the amount of blogs/literary sites and forums that are out there - we reckon that these people do exist in certain numbers. We just have to find find and convince them that our platform is right for them.

How about becoming the twitter of stories? Limit it to 140 words or something (analogous to the 4K compos from the Amiga demo scene).
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