Another enthusiastic "Oh wow, Google bought us! We're going to be doing so many new things now!" followed by "Sorry we're shutting down" in a few weeks. Happens every time. Isn't that what Google does? They buy a company. Half of the team leaves because they can't go through Google interview and the other half is disbanded to work on other Google projects.
Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
111–120 of 167 posts
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
For Packstation they had some serious problems with phishing. At first you only needed your Packstation User Number and the PIN. They then disallowed logins with user number and required the membership card. But it seems they started skimming those, so starting from last month they send you a TAN to your cellphone when the package arrives and you need card+TAN. From what I see Bufferbox right now only has a few locat…
Amazon and Bufferbox did the sensible thing from the start: one time use access codes.
Via email. Not very hard to hack.
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#113>Eventually the company plans to charge $3 or $4 per package. Wow, not sure that was ever going to be feasible. Won't be an issue now that Google bought them. Good for them!
I would pay that in a heartbeat. Living in an apartment is a nightmare for receiving packages. I hate getting the missed package slip and then having to call and arrange for me to pick up the package at their facility 20 minutes away. I've had to wait 2 hours at the sorting facility for them to find my package before. So to me, $3 seems like a steal when faced with all that.
Our apartment is awful for receiving packages... UPS and FedEx can't even get in the front gate. But I just get packages sent to work, so there's not a problem at all.
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#114The UK equivalent is CollectPlus http://www.collectplus.co.uk/faqs#local_shop_section . Instead of picking up goods from a locker in a public area, you pick up your parcel from a convenience store. The convenience store use their Paypoint terminal to identify you and your item and get the item from their stockroom back of house. The advantage for the convenience store over lockers is they don't waste front of house s…
There is also Amazon Locker in some places in the UK which is Amazon's equivalent. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp...
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
How does the security of BufferBox/Amazon Locker compare to Packstation? To get your packet out of a Packstation, you need both the (magnetic strip) card that they send you on signup and a one-time PIN they send via SMS (not email). This might not sound "easy", but there has been a lot of abuse in the past years so that DHL was forced to step up security. How do the US systems compare? Have there been reports on abus…
For Bufferbox, when the package is delivered to the box, they send you an email with an access code, and you have to enter the access code. As far as build quality and strength, they seem pretty solid, and I haven't heard of any abuse stories from the Bufferbox guys.
I wouldn't call it solid: All that the 'bad guy' needs to go shopping with a stolen CC is control over an email box of a BufferBox customer. DHL had to learn it the hard way, and I'm sure they didn't come up with two factor authentication (card+pin knowledge) and out-of-band (SMS) PIN transmission without a reason. We'll see how it works out in the US..
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#116The one thing I take from this is Google is very comfortable with software, and electronic hardware, but less so elsewhere.
Buying in bufferbox will just be early stages of a "buffer region" of satellite companies all bridging the virtual pure world of the google core and daily life.
Anything that currently has a key, is inefficiently owned and not shared, is fair game
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#117This is a german Packstation: http://images.computerwoche.de/images/computerwoche/bdb/1841... Welcome to the future, America. I'd be happy to see what a startup under Google can do, but the competition isn't exactly asleep.
The same was launched and failed in the same place (Toronto) in the year 2000, with locations at Go and Subway stations. I think Google will want to change the business model radically in some way.
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#118The UK equivalent is CollectPlus http://www.collectplus.co.uk/faqs#local_shop_section . Instead of picking up goods from a locker in a public area, you pick up your parcel from a convenience store. The convenience store use their Paypoint terminal to identify you and your item and get the item from their stockroom back of house. The advantage for the convenience store over lockers is they don't waste front of house s…
There is also Amazon Locker in some places in the UK which is Amazon's equivalent. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp...
My local corner-shop just replaced a two-meter stretch of birthday/christmas/congratulations cards with some of these Amazon lockers.
First time I'd seen them, and apparently they get a lot of usage.
Re: Google acquires BufferBox (YC S12)
#119Slightly offtopic tangent: So by now we're all aware that these are already ubiquitous in Europe. The question I have is why it took so long to reach the US? Why didn't the main shipping companies there like FedEx and UPS step up and use their existing infrastructure to build something like this, much more easily than a startup could do.
Amazon has been doing this for a few years in the US. Bufferbox is actually only in Canada. It's not a service I need, and definitely not one I'd pay extra for. I live in an apartment. The apartment office signs for and stores my packages. If I lived in a house, in an area where people would steal the package left on my doorstep, then I might use something like this. It would have to be really convenient though.
Most apartments do not have someone to sign for packages and missed deliveries are a pain. It's definitely worth paying $3 to avoid them m