4 ms·

Rate my friend's startup: Rundown Creator, a production tool for broadcast media

11 points by randall 16y ago

randall 16y ago
My good buddy Jeff, a HN reader, is too modest to submit this himself, but it's a pretty cool project for broadcast nerds. If you're familiar, it's similar to enterprise solutions like ENPS / iNews, but costs a lot less. (A LOT less. I think too much less.)
lachyg 16y ago
Looks like a very cool and well built product. Congrats to him. I'd be interested in knowing what sort of market their is for this software?
- rundowncreator 16y ago
  Thanks! There's a pretty decent-sized market for it, made up of: -High schools -Middle schools -Colleges -Churches -Public access TV stations -Independent production companies -Podcasters -Etc. Some of our current clients include: -Revision3 -MLB.com -San Diego State University. We have a fair amount of competition, but they are all targeting larger operations. We are the only company that's tailored to smaller operations that just need basic features like creating rundowns, timing shows, managing scripts, and integrating with teleprompters.
  - lachyg 16y ago
    Wow, impressive list. How did you go about acquiring those customers, or did they come to you? How are people finding your site in general (schools, etc). I'll pass your site onto the media class at my school!
    - rundowncreator 16y ago
      Thanks. Most came to us, but I did approach one or two of them. I certainly appreciate the referral!
anigbrowl 16y ago
Excellent. Only negative: Do you offer plans for less than 50 users [$35/mo]? No, sorry, that's as low as we go. Turn that frown upside down! $35/mo is cheap, emphasize that it could benefit a team of 5 up to 50. Right now it suggests teams of fewer people wouldn't benefit, when they definitely would. You don't just have to do it for news. any little magazine show would benefit from this, even if they didn't use a teleprompter. Things I've worked on that this would assist - cooking shows, corporate gigs, local ad spots, doco production, magazine shows. Lots of freelance producers could benefit. It's not my bread and butter anymore, but I've bookmarked it - if I were asked to help out on such a project, it would have paid for itself after an hour of work...which is the minimum time it would take me to build a template in Excel or similar. Software-in-a-box to do the same thing is hideously unpleasant to use and about 10x the price. I think you can get a ton of small users. Hell, try it at $45/mo (so you can give a small 'discount' to the volume purchasers instead of linear price increases.
- rundowncreator 16y ago
  I appreciate your feedback and totally agree with you on the 50 users thing. I will have to think about how to change the wording on it. It is the question I get most!

11 points by randall 16y ago

My good buddy Jeff, a HN reader, is too modest to submit this himself, but it's a pretty cool project for broadcast nerds. If you're familiar, it's similar to enterprise solutions like ENPS / iNews, but costs a lot less. (A LOT less. I think too much less.)

lachyg 16y ago

Looks like a very cool and well built product. Congrats to him. I'd be interested in knowing what sort of market their is for this software?

rundowncreator 16y ago
Thanks! There's a pretty decent-sized market for it, made up of: -High schools -Middle schools -Colleges -Churches -Public access TV stations -Independent production companies -Podcasters -Etc. Some of our current clients include: -Revision3 -MLB.com -San Diego State University. We have a fair amount of competition, but they are all targeting larger operations. We are the only company that's tailored to smaller operations that just need basic features like creating rundowns, timing shows, managing scripts, and integrating with teleprompters.
- lachyg 16y ago
  Wow, impressive list. How did you go about acquiring those customers, or did they come to you? How are people finding your site in general (schools, etc). I'll pass your site onto the media class at my school!
  - rundowncreator 16y ago
    Thanks. Most came to us, but I did approach one or two of them. I certainly appreciate the referral!

anigbrowl 16y ago

Excellent. Only negative: Do you offer plans for less than 50 users [$35/mo]? No, sorry, that's as low as we go. Turn that frown upside down! $35/mo is cheap, emphasize that it could benefit a team of 5 up to 50. Right now it suggests teams of fewer people wouldn't benefit, when they definitely would. You don't just have to do it for news. any little magazine show would benefit from this, even if they didn't use a teleprompter. Things I've worked on that this would assist - cooking shows, corporate gigs, local ad spots, doco production, magazine shows. Lots of freelance producers could benefit. It's not my bread and butter anymore, but I've bookmarked it - if I were asked to help out on such a project, it would have paid for itself after an hour of work...which is the minimum time it would take me to build a template in Excel or similar. Software-in-a-box to do the same thing is hideously unpleasant to use and about 10x the price. I think you can get a ton of small users. Hell, try it at $45/mo (so you can give a small 'discount' to the volume purchasers instead of linear price increases.

rundowncreator 16y ago
I appreciate your feedback and totally agree with you on the 50 users thing. I will have to think about how to change the wording on it. It is the question I get most!