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Magic+

getmagicnow.com

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Re: Magic+

#301

Post by FireBeyond »

op00to wrote: post #275
chemmail wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will probably take those 10 hours being on old for comcast to pickup. You think i'm joking.

Why wouldn't Magic+ have a relationship with Comcast where they can bypass the queues? Seems like a natural relationship to have.

Then I, as someone who manages a remote development shop and pays Comcast in the several thousands a month for Internet access, would be pissed that -I- don't get such access.

Why on earth should Magic have a "preferred relationship" so they can make money letting their customers skip the line I'm waiting in?

Re: Magic+

#302

Post by exadeci »

op00to wrote: post #275
chemmail wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will probably take those 10 hours being on old for comcast to pickup. You think i'm joking.

Why wouldn't Magic+ have a relationship with Comcast where they can bypass the queues? Seems like a natural relationship to have.

They are a small startup. I think that credit cards personal assistants would have better contacts.

Re: Magic+

#303

Post by toddmorey »

rtpg wrote: post #166
paul wrote: post #106

A lot of skepticism here, which is understandable given the somewhat unbelievable scope of what they are promising. I'm a very active user of Magic+, so I'll give my perspective. (and of course I've been working with them from the beginning at YC, so you're also free to discard my opinion as biased) For me, Magic+ is basically the impossibly good personal assistant, kind of like Jarvis in Iron Man, or Emily in The De…

>but my expectation (as an investor) is that as the tech improves they will be able to bring down the price while maintaining or even improving the quality of the service Call me skeptical, but where exactly is the tech involved? Currently this is just text messages going to people + people doing the things. One possibility would be through AI (a bit of a weasel word most of the time, honestly), but Google and Apple…

There's a decent amount of innovation that can make the assistants more efficient, so you can improve profitability without driving down wages. But there's also something else:

Since a high percentage of services will likely end in a transaction, there's a huge opportunity to become the Amazon-scale retailer of services. I find I don't even google products I want to buy anymore, I just immediately search Amazon. Amazon is my retail UI. If Magic can do the same thing in this space—become the service UI—I'd imagine it won't be long before more revenue comes form partnerships than directly from consumers.

Re: Magic+

#304

Post by joslin01 »

themartorana wrote: post #293
joslin01 wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a middle class person struggling to get day by day -- yes, yes it is.

Semantics, but if you're struggling, you're not middle class. At least not in the classical sense. It's a shame the downward pressures that have made "struggling to get by" the middle class norm. The whole point of the thriving middle class (in the US at least) was that, with a willingness to work, you could live comfortably, with a house and two cars and 2 kids. This isn't meant to be insulting or directed at you -…

Well we all have our struggles I suppose. I hear what you're saying though. I think money has lost a lot of its value.

Re: Magic+

#305

Post by justinpombrio »

mbrameld wrote: post #200
Archio wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> such as having food from a restaurant across the country sent to me via chilled overnight air mail for a friend's birthday as a big flashy surprise Maybe I'm missing something here, but this is making me seriously think about what Magic's target market is. What kind of income would a person need to fathom affording something like that? I know people who I would consider "wealthy" on a first-world scale but this see…

You wouldn't need an extravagant income to do something like that. I just did a quick check and it costs less than $150 to overnight an 8lb package from NY to SF with 8am delivery. So the markup over just buying the meal at the restaurant is going to be less than $300 once you add refrigerated packaging and pay somebody to order it, pick it up, package it, and ship it. That's pricey if you're doing it every week, but…

Really - a $300 birthday gift to your friend? According to this website[1], the median American family has a combined income of 81k and spends about 1k of that on gifts. That's for the whole household, so more like $500/year for your friends. You're probably not going to blow half of that on one friend's birthday dinner.

Of course there are plenty of people for who this is reasonable, but please don't be so ignorant of what "middle class" means.

[1] http://visual.ly/how-average-american-family-spends-money

Re: Magic+

#306

Post by FireBeyond »

meowface wrote: post #168
irascible wrote: post #163

Seeing this makes me feel ashamed to be a part of the tech industry. This is why people despise the 1%. Show some taste/humility/discretion. A "service" like this is so narrowly focused on the ultra rich, that it should be marketing in high end magazines/direct outreach.. not on hacker news.

How is this distasteful? First off, $100 for a "we'll do whatever you want service" is not restricted to the ultra rich. But they also say they charge by the minute, not by the hour. If something only takes a few minutes, you pay ~$8.

Yeah. After you've paid your "minimum block of 10 hours" for $1000 and then you're using your 'service credit'. Or your $3000/mo subscription...

Re: Magic+

#307

Post by FireBeyond »

tempestn wrote: post #116
jameshart wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that conveys how people really use the service, then, to many people, it also conveys that the people who use the service are, on average, lazy rich douchebags. If that isn't what you want to portray about your brand, you might want to reconsider your examples.

It conveys that the users are rich, yes. What about it makes them lazy or douchebags? Assuming you're rich, is it a logical use of your time to, for instance, go through the process of tracking down and renting a bunch of cars for some event online? Or would it make more sense to pay someone else $100/hour (considerably less than the opportunity cost of doing it yourself) to do it for you? Does wanting to meet a cele…

Most of those things would probably cost you a whole lot less if, unlike 80% of the examples, they weren't "extreme/extravagant request, NOW NOW NOW!".

Re: Magic+

#308

Post by exco »

captaindiego wrote: post #76

It says it works from anywhere, but then only gives a number that works from within the US. How are you supposed to use this service while in another country and not having access to a US sim card?

Sounds like that's a problem that Magic+ can solve for 100/hr.

Re: Magic+

#309

Post by FireBeyond »

tedmiston wrote: post #267

> Q: How much does it cost? > It’s $100/hr to use Magic+. You only get charged for the minutes you use it for. If your request takes 12 minutes, you’ll only be charged for 12 minutes. This could be affordable in small does depending how much time a human is allocated to do the task. I wonder if it's possible to know the estimate before you commit to buying.

Not so much. You need to either buy a block of 10 hours for $1,000, or sign up to a $3K/mo subscription, as your minimum entry point.

Re: Magic+

#310

Post by FireBeyond »

pbreit wrote: post #148
cmikec wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the feedback. You're right, you bring up a good point that isn't explained as much on the website as it could be. We actually track time down to the second and display really detailed reports to users every day about how the time was utilized. Quite often a simple request can end up being $3-$4.

To-the-second metering sounds awful.

The interview for the Magicians ensures they don't stutter - or does it?
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