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FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

theatlantic.com

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Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#11

Post by levlandau »

slashedzero wrote: post #6

The article mentions the competition for FamilyLeaf, but does not give any inkling of a clue as to how they'll overcome the competition and really the bigger competition from Facebook. Simply saying their confident it will fill the niche doesn't give me any reason to choose it over the myriad of other services lifted. I'm also not really in the target demographic, but if someone asked me why they should choose to use…

The article does implicitly address why this is an alternative to Facebook. "We feel that your work life and your social life have been well-addressed online, but no service has truly helped you stay in touch with your family".

Facebook is not for intimate conversation with your family. Path is mobile-first and isn't as big of a thing (yet). Google+ allows you define circles but is rather complicated. As with other spaces where network effects are important, only the biggest will survive and the biggest currently (Path/Google+/others) do not address the family niche conclusively (product wise/platorm wise).

The real question is whether the family niche itself is an important enough one to a large enough base of people. It makes more sense to assume that this is the case...than not right? The upside here is pretty huge if there's something to it.

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#13

Post by zrail »

I wonder if there would be a market out there for some kind of host-your-own system like this. Run an app on your family's central machine and register YourFamily.examplehostedapp.com. The app does the work of keeping that domain name pointed at your machine and keeping a upnp tunnel open.

One interesting question is backups. Encrypted snapshots to S3, maybe?

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#14

Post by liuhenry »

webwanderings wrote: post #3

Looks all nice and such but the family member role at the time of the sign up, seems limiting. What if your family is small based on the available relationship in the dropdown? You wouldn't bother creating a new social network just for one or two people. If the "family incharge" (as per your FAQ) can possibly extend the family he/she creates later on, than I think it should be identified first. I think ultimately, th…

Thanks for the feedback! You're absolutely right about the family role dropdown. We put it there as a temporary fix while we built a more comprehensive "family tree" feature, and we'll be replacing it shortly so you can more accurately represent the relationships within your family.

Per your second point, we're extremely grateful to our early adopters who've taken the initiative to try us out with their family. We're constantly working to improve the product from feedback like yours, and trying to lower the barrier so those network builders do take the initiative. Would love to chat if you have any suggestions or concerns about the product!

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#15

Post by pclark »

zrail wrote: post #13

I wonder if there would be a market out there for some kind of host-your-own system like this. Run an app on your family's central machine and register YourFamily.examplehostedapp.com. The app does the work of keeping that domain name pointed at your machine and keeping a upnp tunnel open. One interesting question is backups. Encrypted snapshots to S3, maybe?

who self-hosts anything in 2012?

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#16

Post by eric-hu »

pclark wrote: post #15
zrail wrote: post #13

I wonder if there would be a market out there for some kind of host-your-own system like this. Run an app on your family's central machine and register YourFamily.examplehostedapp.com. The app does the work of keeping that domain name pointed at your machine and keeping a upnp tunnel open. One interesting question is backups. Encrypted snapshots to S3, maybe?

who self-hosts anything in 2012?

Some people who use Tor do

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#17

Post by loceng »

patrickg wrote: post #7

I don't understand: how is this more secure? Maybe I don't understand the meaning of the word 'secure' in this context. Photos and everything is still stored on a remote uncontrolled server.

Might just be trying to expand the meaning of private / more privacy..

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#18

Post by sluckxz »

zrail wrote: post #13

I wonder if there would be a market out there for some kind of host-your-own system like this. Run an app on your family's central machine and register YourFamily.examplehostedapp.com. The app does the work of keeping that domain name pointed at your machine and keeping a upnp tunnel open. One interesting question is backups. Encrypted snapshots to S3, maybe?

I would be part of that market if something nice was available.

I have test installed a diaspora pod as well as a libertree tree. Diaspora has its well documented issues and libertree is still bleeding edge.

Re: FamilyLeaf (YC W12) - Your Family's Private Social Network

#19

Post by sluckxz »

patrickg wrote: post #7

I don't understand: how is this more secure? Maybe I don't understand the meaning of the word 'secure' in this context. Photos and everything is still stored on a remote uncontrolled server.

I don't see where it says "more secure". Secure only shows up once in the article and once in their privacy policy.

Perhaps it would be better to stick to "privacy" as that's the value i see here.

the privacy policy states: ... affiliated organizations that (i) need to know that information in order to process it on FamilyLeaf’s behalf or to provide services available at FamilyLeaf’s websites, and (ii) that have agreed not to disclose it to others.

Looks cool! I'm hopeful they will be around awhile.

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