News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

leemhoffman

leemhoffman on Hacker News

Re:Android is for startups on Wednesday September 04, 2013 @03:21PM (#6329787)
The IOS Development process is outdated and kind of crappy, but there are simple tacitly accepted solutions that fix virtually all of the issues. Specifically:

- Hockey App For Pre Public Distribution - Auto Updates, One Click Link Install (no need to join a google group) - Enterprise account - no device ids, send the link to anyone

The dev cycle on mobile is slower, and more waterfall, but there is no excuse to not be iterating on anything more than 3-5 day cycles on either android or IOS.

Poetry of a Startup Founder

Posted by leemhoffman on Wednesday February 20, 2013 @11:33AM
from the self-post dept.

A fellow startup founder said this today, thought it was well stated:"In the end people like us don't really have a choice. its a compulsion. and the only way to deal with it is to indulge the drive win, loose, or draw.Sometimes I'm actually envious of normal people who can just go a job that pays well and don't strive for anything else out of life. I guess this is our cross to bear. We all...

( Read More... | no comments | on HN )
Re:Is Poke Proof That The Facebook API Is A Trojan Horse? on Saturday December 22, 2012 @01:17PM (#4957074)
I think this is the key question. I don't have an answer, but I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on it.
Re:Is Poke Proof That The Facebook API Is A Trojan Horse? on Saturday December 22, 2012 @01:16PM (#4957070)
The problem, and I speak from first hand experience here, is that its increasingly hard to make a successful consumer product that does not leverage these apis. They are accelerants, and if our primary goal is to find product market fit and take the market before anyone else, not using those accelerants can be quite detrimental.
Re:Is Poke Proof That The Facebook API Is A Trojan Horse? on Saturday December 22, 2012 @01:13PM (#4957063)
My suspicion is that App Store rank doesn't necessarily translate into highly used app. Many of the highly ranked apps get there by buying downloads. There definitely is a ton of open data on app success out there, though spotting an app with an organically fast growth rate and high DAU is probably much harder without access to quality data.
Re:Is Poke Proof That The Facebook API Is A Trojan Horse? on Saturday December 22, 2012 @01:05PM (#4957046)
Thanks for expanding this out, I jotted this out as a quick thought, without probably giving context to people who haven't been following the story over the last couple days.

Is Poke Proof That The Facebook API Is A Trojan Horse?

Posted by leemhoffman on Saturday December 22, 2012 @10:36AM
from the self-post dept.

It seems to be common belief in startup land, that if you're smart and lucky enough to build a wildly successful consumer product, by the time competitors (particularly the 800lb gorillas) copy you, your network effects, market ownership, and brand will help insulate you.It's why, I imagine, Foursquare still exists after Facebook places, why Facebook bought Instagram, and honestly why Facebook...

( Read More... | 42 comments | 82 points | on HN )
Re:Gmail as a Facade on Tuesday September 04, 2012 @10:13PM (#4477576)
If your gmail is slow there is a simple and effective solution. I've had gmail for years and actually pay for my google apps account. Like the author I assumed my growing mailbox size and filters were the reason for the increasing slowness. So I contacted support and after some investigation they noticed that I had tons of polling requests that were slowing down my account from connected apps (think greplin). They suggested I remove them. I was skeptical, but I did. Immediately gmail was BLAZING fast again. If your gmail or google apps is slow I highly recommend removing all connected apps ASAP:

https://www.google.com/accounts/IssuedAuthSubTokens

Re:TechStars, Lies & Videotape on Thursday October 20, 2011 @02:08PM (#3136040)
Thanks Bobby (re: pivot), TechStars has been amazing for us, just thought people should know.
Re:TechStars, Lies & Videotape on Thursday October 20, 2011 @01:33PM (#3135864)
Hey we were in the TechStars NYC class and in the TV show (Veri). I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this, but TechStars was the best thing to ever happen to us. We came in with a prototype and in three months had a product, traction, funding, and a great network of mentors to help us. We couldn't have done this without them. Regardless of how people feel about the idea of a TV show, I'm very grateful to TechStars for everything they've done and I think any TechStars CEO would say the same.

- Lee Hoffman (CEO, VERI)

Re:Startup 3.0: How to Build a Better Web Startup on Monday March 01, 2010 @12:27PM (#1159196)
SteD, I think this is now fixed. Let me know.
Re:Startup 3.0: How to Build a Better Web Startup on Monday March 01, 2010 @10:30AM (#1158871)
Your analysis is spot on, and our hypothesis is that if we can deliver a framework that makes online education much better, that there will be a variety of uses for it - everything from paid courses on SEO (in demand hi-tech skills), to free courses on fun things like "MacBeth in an hour" (launching later this week). Our plan right now is to implement an app store like model where educators can create courses for free, but if they want to charge for them, we get a % of the revenue.
Re:Startup 3.0: How to Build a Better Web Startup on Monday March 01, 2010 @10:21AM (#1158848)
We completely agree, and will probably change that in the future. We force signup now for 2 reasons: 1) Right now the most important thing for us is to establish product market fit. And the way we do that is by sending a survey after you take a course, and by seeing where you drop off - both require signup. 2) It lets us keep track of your state (so you can stop, start, come back), and allows you to participate in the exercise / notes, both key pieces of functionality in taking the course.
Re:Startup 3.0: How to Build a Better Web Startup on Monday March 01, 2010 @10:17AM (#1158841)
Yeah we pretty much just put that up there last minute because we couldn't use the term "Lean Startup" (which is a Registered Trademark of Eric Ries). We're talking to Eric about fixing that.

Older »