Say what you want about it, but to class it as a mistake is wrong in my opinion. Back when Twitter was getting a lot of bad press from developers, the founder saw a market niche and successfully got backing from lots of people in that niche ... Enough devs were willing to stump up $50 to get something like the Twitter API without limits (or the client side ads).
The Great App.net Mistake
41–50 of 70 posts
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#42Mat Honan deserves credit for one of the clearest, most concise descriptions of what App.net is (or intends to be): > Imagine this. You sign up for Vine, and build up a robust friend network and library of videos. But then you try out Instagram’s new video sharing, and decide you like its editing features a lot better. > Normally, this would mean starting over, with no friends and no files. But let’s say that both of…
In an ideal world services would give you YOUR data, instead of locking you in, allowing you to easily export all your data -- ideally in an open format -- that could be imported to other services.
It's much worse than that. Exporting and importing does not preserve social connections. You need either federation or a benevolent monopoly.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#43If people don't want their social network to be at the whims of a company, why not go all the way and adopt the Tent protocol? http://tent.io I mean, I can see why from a developer's point of view. Those $30k a month are enticing. But why would users care?
Devil's advocate: Maybe that $30K can pay for good UX which users definitely care about.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#44Mat Honan deserves credit for one of the clearest, most concise descriptions of what App.net is (or intends to be): > Imagine this. You sign up for Vine, and build up a robust friend network and library of videos. But then you try out Instagram’s new video sharing, and decide you like its editing features a lot better. > Normally, this would mean starting over, with no friends and no files. But let’s say that both of…
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Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#45Mat Honan deserves credit for one of the clearest, most concise descriptions of what App.net is (or intends to be): > Imagine this. You sign up for Vine, and build up a robust friend network and library of videos. But then you try out Instagram’s new video sharing, and decide you like its editing features a lot better. > Normally, this would mean starting over, with no friends and no files. But let’s say that both of…
I had it all wrong. App.net is the new Ning. Or, I still have it all wrong.
Wow. I recall Ning. So many "social networks" on Ning lasted what, an hour? And to think, my boss was secretly orgasiming at the notion of the company bundling private social networks on the cheap through Ning. D'oh.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#46I'll give App.net one thing: They get more press on HN than any other irrelevant company in the world.
They have funding. Journalists like free lunches.
I think it's more that they have lower odds of success (at their current mission) than most startups, but if they're successful, a bigger impact. And fundamentally it's meta, so more interesting than any given startup -- there's more of a philosophical argument behind it than just a better designed chat client or whatever.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is a shame. 90% of the criticisms I've seen of App.net were mocking it for being 'an open source twitter' and completely ignored its ambitions to encompass general social network features.
Or that it's not open source.
It's not like there aren't F/OSS Twitter clones... just look at StatusNet.
Or Pump.io, which (AFAICT) is a Facebook/Google+/Diaspora clone.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#48>That’s where the new narrative of ADN as Twitter for elitists took hold, especially because its users were decidedly male and white, and because it launched just as industry critics were starting to launch attacks on the white male dominated world of new social services.
Oh no, those evil white men are at it again, always innovating and inventing new cool stuff!
Fucking racist and sexist hypocrites.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#49Mat Honan deserves credit for one of the clearest, most concise descriptions of what App.net is (or intends to be): > Imagine this. You sign up for Vine, and build up a robust friend network and library of videos. But then you try out Instagram’s new video sharing, and decide you like its editing features a lot better. > Normally, this would mean starting over, with no friends and no files. But let’s say that both of…
Except even this doesn't make sense. Presumably Vine handles the videos on its own backend, and you only get your social graph when you move over to Instagram.
Unless you're going to provide free infrastructure for every component (not just the social graph) there will be an element of lock-in to virtually any social product.
Re: The Great App.net Mistake
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because you can have your own backend that does anything you want, and just uses App.net for the social graph.
At that point wouldn't you be better off using a bigger social graph?
Twitter only allows you access to 100k users or so (tokens), and your business is at risk of being turned off.
or
App.net providers you access to 150k+ users growing user base. Plus an a free sign up, access to hosting for file storage, and permissive messaging.