Live data from Hacker News

Magic+

getmagicnow.com

61–70 of 498 posts

Re: Magic+

#61
post #17

> Q: What about the purchases that I make through Magic+? > There is no markup on the purchases you make through Magic+. We find you the best deals that we can on every purchase, and we negotiate strongly with vendors. Often you will save more money using Magic+ than if you had done things yourself. ... I see a conflict of interest there.

Granted, but they're also making $100/hr to fulfill your request. Sure, people are greedy, but I feel like you could staff some pretty honest, capable, and reliable dispatchers at $33/hr (using a standard 3x billing vs salary multiplier).

Re: Magic+

#63
post #55
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, pretty hyperbolic. There are a lot of cases where they will have to say no or "sorry, we'll have to set that up for another time". Some requests are simply not always possible. To pick one of their examples: "I need to rent out the Exploratorium this weekend." What if someone already rented it out? Or it's under construction? Or there's a special event? Or *?

[deleted]

Where's the "Uber of assassins" when you them?

Re: Magic+

#64

Looks like the reception isn't doing too well. I remember when Magic launched here on HN and it BLEW up. I was one of the people who tried it out. I live in NYC and actually had a poor experience. The first two times, I said "hey I want a sandwich with [x]" and I got it but it took a lot longer than if I just clicked the necessary buttons on Seamless. Then I kept getting random calls from time to time from pizza deli…

> If I were rich, hey sure why not boss someone around for random things (though I don't know why I wouldn't just hire someone I can trust). However, if you're middle income or even a little higher, what's the point really? Everything else is basically on-demand in this new uber-fied world.

Judging by the price and the copy in the page, I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually targeted at rich people.

Re: Magic+

#65
post #45

I thought this was satire. Came here to see the jokes. None of you seem to be treating it like satire though.

Why did you think it was satire? They're just trying to offer a personal assistant service over the air, nothing that beyond imagination. Likely costs less than actually employing someone.

Re: Magic+

#66

I really am not a fan of the hyperminimalistic "we can do anything trust us!" landing pages that every text-for-personal-assistant seems to think is brilliant marketing copy. There are examples of Magic+ requests , but no real-world examples of outcomes and whether the request was filled successfully to the customer's satisfaction. Relatedly, the $100/hr is suspicious because it's impossible to audit the time spent b…

I feel like the whole thing is being oversold. They're making huge claims on this page and I have no idea whether or not they're true. > Never says no > Hits 100% of promises and expectations I'm sure these are achievable...

Thanks for bringing this up. We've adjusted these bullet points to make them more accurate.

Re: Magic+

#67
post #64

Looks like the reception isn't doing too well. I remember when Magic launched here on HN and it BLEW up. I was one of the people who tried it out. I live in NYC and actually had a poor experience. The first two times, I said "hey I want a sandwich with [x]" and I got it but it took a lot longer than if I just clicked the necessary buttons on Seamless. Then I kept getting random calls from time to time from pizza deli…

> If I were rich, hey sure why not boss someone around for random things (though I don't know why I wouldn't just hire someone I can trust). However, if you're middle income or even a little higher, what's the point really? Everything else is basically on-demand in this new uber-fied world. Judging by the price and the copy in the page, I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually targeted at rich people.

Yes - plus appears to be targeted at rich people ("I need to have 6 convertibles by tomorrow"). But remove that trailing `/plus` at the end of the URL and you have their base product Magic, which isn't.

Re: Magic+

#68
post #48
post #35

“Find someone to train me like Jason Bourne.” “Get me a mobile dentist to my office ASAP.” “I want to meet Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.” “I need to rent out the Exploratorium this weekend.” “I need 6 convertibles tomorrow for rent.” “Organize my team for a town hall tomorrow.” “My 1 pm ran over. Bump my meetings back 1 hour.” “I’m out of the office today. Check my email and let me know if there’s anything urgent.” They'…

These are all real requests that our users have actually used Magic+ for. We obviously cant divulge their identities, or show photographs, etc. (since these are personal things), but it's important to convey how people really use the service. I'd love ideas on how we can communicate this point better. Part of what our users love about Magic+ is that you truly can do some pretty amazing things with it.

Did you fulfil any of these requests?

Re: Magic+

#69
post #43

Out of my world, but I could see why the super-rich might like something like this. But I guess they have their own personal assistants for this stuff anyway.

I'm far from super rich, but I make a small multiple of most senior dev salaries, and I could see this being useful

If you make 3x of senior dev salary in the SF then you are in the 1%. So i'd probably consider you super rich.

Re: Magic+

#70

So this is just Amex Plat/Centurion concierge for people who prefer to text than call?

Have you tried Amex Platinum concierge? If they can deliver, this looks better in practice.

FWIW I've been very impressed by what the Amex Plat concierge can do
Post reply on HN