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Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

spot.xyz

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Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#21

Post by astlouis44 »

ghempton wrote: post #2

One of authors here. As a kid, some of my most meaningful relationships and experiences were forged through online gaming (UO anyone?). A big part of this wasn’t necessarily the game itself, but was instead the sense of place and community afforded through the shared environment. As an adult, many of my most meaningful relationships have come from my work environment. When working remotely or in a distributed setting…

Congrats on the launch. I have to ask though... how do you plan to differentiate? As I'm sure you are aware, there has been at least 25 (likely more) of these exact same web-based, 3D spaces platforms for remote work as an interactive alternative to Zoom. All launched since COVID, all offering pretty similar value propositions.

Why should anyone use this over a competitor?

Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#23

Post by astlouis44 »

ghempton wrote: post #11
Fission wrote: post #6

There are a lot of virtual office tools out there (I'm not affiliated with any so I feel comfortable asking this question). What makes Spot compelling vs. the alternatives? And if the main difference is 3D, how have you leveraged that to create a differentiated experience?

1. 3D is definitely a differentiator, but we consider it more of an implementation detail. It does come with some really cool stuff like the ability to have a first-person view (really neat to be able to give a presentation in FP). A 3D interface affords a lot of really fun ways to interact with emotes and things and we have beta support for things like wearables. 2. We are investing a lot in asynchronous modes of co…

1. Many of them are 3D, that is not a differentiator in the slightest.

2. Again, these features are already prevalent or under active development by many of your competitors.

3.Also not novel.

Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#27

Post by jfoucher »

I tried signing up and I got a collection of most useless error messages, such as Unauthorized, Forbidden, Email is in use and so on. The Email is in use one does not seem so useless, but it really is if you get it when you try again with the same email address after getting one of the other messages...

Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#28

Post by ilaksh »

ghempton wrote: post #5
technoplato wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I surprisingly love using these kinds of environments and this one looks neat. What’s going to be the pricing model moving forward. Surely voice and such can’t be free in perpetuity. Nice work!

Good question! Right now we are fortunate to have some AWS credits to subsidize some voice costs :P. At the moment our focus is on usage, but our goal is to have a freemium model based on the size of the space, premium assets, etc.

AWS will jack you, be careful. Those credits get used up, free/cheap quota used, services grind to a halt and somehow you owe $500 after a week.

I mean.. you just have to pay attention. And maybe think about making a pricing page.

Personally I love the idea, especially 3D and programmability.

Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#29

Post by Uehreka »

astlouis44 wrote: post #21
ghempton wrote: post #2

One of authors here. As a kid, some of my most meaningful relationships and experiences were forged through online gaming (UO anyone?). A big part of this wasn’t necessarily the game itself, but was instead the sense of place and community afforded through the shared environment. As an adult, many of my most meaningful relationships have come from my work environment. When working remotely or in a distributed setting…

Congrats on the launch. I have to ask though... how do you plan to differentiate? As I'm sure you are aware, there has been at least 25 (likely more) of these exact same web-based, 3D spaces platforms for remote work as an interactive alternative to Zoom. All launched since COVID, all offering pretty similar value propositions. Why should anyone use this over a competitor?

I see this question asked a lot on HN, and certainly with good reason: Every founder should be constantly asking themselves this question. However, I think it’s important to also play Devil’s Advocate and note that some products succeed not because they differentiated themselves against competitors, but simply because a large number of people learned about them before learning about their (possibly better, possibly cheaper) competitors, and then network effects start to take over from there.

Re: Show HN: Free 3D virtual office in the browser

#30

Post by ghempton »

jfoucher wrote: post #27

I tried signing up and I got a collection of most useless error messages, such as Unauthorized, Forbidden, Email is in use and so on. The Email is in use one does not seem so useless, but it really is if you get it when you try again with the same email address after getting one of the other messages...

Thanks for the feedback. Any other details you feel ok sharing about how you signed up? Was this using oauth?
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