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Google just launched prizes.org
- clloyd 15y agocough Google you own your own single sign on technology cough
- gojomo 15y agoBut if you sign in with your Google account, how will Prizes (and by extension, every other Google service) get your list of Facebook friends?
- mattdeboard 15y agoIf G+ wants my list of Facebook friends, all they have to do is ask. I'll gladly hand it over.
- xtal 15y agoNot everybody is you.
- forkrulassail 15y agoInteresting that you login with Facebook connect and Twitter, but no google login.
- panabee 15y agoAgreed, why do you think this is?
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- dvdhsu 15y agoThis seems fairly exploitable. I post a question, and wait for answers. I create another account and answer it. I pick my own answer as the best answer, and I lose no money. I gain the information that others gave me for free.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- massarog 15y agoThis. When it comes to money, people will exploit it as much as possible. From their FAQ: "Do I have to pick the winner of my contest? If your contest receives less than 5 entries by the time it ends, you're not obligated to pick a winner. You have the option to extend the contest for seven (7) days for free. 'Extend Contest' and 'Contact us' link information is available on the contest page. So, what if I just forget to log back in and award people the prize? Does google automatically pick a winner?
- andypants 15y agoElsewhere in the faq, it says that if you don't choose a winner, the winner will be automatically chosen as the answer with the most votes.
- opcon 15y agoYes, google will automatically pick a winner, as explained here in the faq (http://prizes.org/faq http://prizes.org/faq) How does Voting work? You may vote on as many contests as you wish. However, you can only vote for one entry in a given contest each day, and you may not vote for yourself. You do have the option to vote for more entries in the same contest tomorrow! If buyers don't pick a winner when the contest ends, winners will be chosen by popular vote.
- msie 15y agoMaybe they tolerate that behaviour as long as not everyone is doing it. There's probably some automatic way of detecting people cheating the system and suspending the accounts automatically.
- ig1 15y agoYou could say the same thing about Adsense. Stick some adverts on your website and make money by clicking on them. Google's the worlds leading expert in click-fraud, I'm sure they can figure out if you're doing this.
- sshrin 15y agoAm really not sure why this app needs offline access to my data. I've developed Facebook apps myself and it is generally important to clearly specify why an app needs offline access unless the reason is obvious (say an iphone client where logging in each time might be a pain).
- ericflo 15y agoI would have never known this was a Google property.
- nantes 15y agoWhile some of the DNS data points at Google, it's primary DNS server shares the IP address with a DNS server for slide.com. The IP address for that DNS server is part of a block that is allocated to Slide, Inc. at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA which also happens to be the address of Google HQ. Which makes sense, given http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/04/google-buys-slide-for-182-million-getting-more-serious-about-social-games/ http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/04/google-buys-slide-for-182-m.... But no, I wouldn't have thought it was a Google property either. Edit: fix URLs, oops.
- long 15y agoIndeed, the terms of service indicates: "Prizes.org is offered by Slide (part of Google Inc., located at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA, USA)."
- nantes 15y agoAh, indeed. I think more than anything this illustrates the state of my brain after staring at code for well too long--the first thing that occurred to me was that this was spam or some sort of colossal conspiracy. Alright then, time for bed.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- nekitamo 15y agoSigh, I don't want to sign up via Facebook, and I don't want to sign up via Twitter. Goodbye otherwise interesting service.
- bobds 15y agoAnd after you connect with your FB or Twitter, it asks you again for an email/password combo.
- antimora 15y ago... and I am still waiting for a confirmation email, without it I can't sign in.
- silencio 15y agoYou could always create a second, unused Twitter account for signups to services that don't need Twitter tweet access otherwise. I have my main account, and then a second one to sign up for these types of websites, services that want to auth with Twitter that might send tweets I don't want (and then I sign up again with my main account if it checks out just fine), contests, and similar. I'm not against Twitter login or contest use, as I can see that being helpful to lots of people as basically a much more accessible OpenID-like single signon experience. I just don't want to spam my followers nor do I want to associate my main Twitter account with that :)
- mvelie 15y agoThe best part is how the main way to sign in is with facebook connect.
- vessenes 15y agoSurely the facebook single sign on option will not continue, that is, unless slide is some sort of joint venture with outside forces?
- gojomo 15y agoThis is a Google offering that only allows Facebook and Twitter sign-in. That's a bit odd; perhaps it exists for the purpose of getting people to opt their Facebook/Twitter info over to Google? More evidence for this theory: here's what Prizes asks for via Facebook Connect: …name, profile picture, gender, networks, user ID, list of friends, and any other information I've shared with everyone… Prizes may access my data when I'm not using the application. The requester dialog only identifies as 'Prizes', not as Google, which seems a bit shifty. The Prizes 'Privacy Policy' says... We'll treat any such information [from the Social Network Service] under this policy as if you'd given it directly to us. It also links to the main Google privacy policy, which says (in far more words) that Google can use any info you give them to improve any of their services.
- code_duck 15y agoAbout a month ago, Google started showing me info here and there referring to people I follow on Twitter. I didn't understand at the time and still don't know how they matched up my Google account to my Twitter account. The Facebook request details you're quoting are not unusual.
- wyclif 15y agoIs your Twitter linked from your Google profile?
- code_duck 15y agoI didn't even have a Google profile until three days ago. I hadn't entered my full name, had not used the gmail to sign up for anything, have only exchanged 2 emails.
- dstein64 15y ago> I didn't understand at the time and still don't know how they matched up my Google account to my Twitter account The information on http://www.google.com/s2/u/0/search/social http://www.google.com/s2/u/0/search/social can be informative for checking how Google links you with other people. Even if you didn't share your Twitter username with Google, I suppose that if someone on your contacts list shared their Twitter username, Google would be able to make the connection.
- tuhin 15y agoIs there even the wildest possibility that the entire emphasis of using Fb and Twitter as primary sign up options was intentional especially to get social graphs which might not be easily possible directly via G+? I know it sounds far fetched, but we are talking about the gateway to the world of social graph that Facebook is highly unlikely to share especially if it was under the direct banner of Google.
- jpdelatorre 15y agoIt feels to me that it's more of trying to show independence of Slide team from Google.
- antimora 15y agoloading animation is annoying
- modernerd 15y agoScreenshot when logged in: https://img.skitch.com/20110704-j2fdjyed367jcehytnqfp5mea4.png https://img.skitch.com/20110704-j2fdjyed367jcehytnqfp5mea4.p... Initial thoughts and observations: 1. It's 'Stack Overflow for the common (wo)man' with cash instead of reputation. 2. Alternative pitch: "99designs meets Yahoo Answers." 3. The top prize available at the moment awards $50. 4. The sign-up process could be a lot better. Prompting sign-up via twitter/Facebook, then prompting for a prizes.org-only username and password is an unusual approach. 5. 'Contest' creation is currently by invitation only. 6. Answers you give that are accepted become the IP of the person who awarded the prize. (http://prizes.org/faq http://prizes.org/faq ) 7. I'm not yet convinced that there's a huge market for paid responses when the Stack Exchange network and Quora both offer large userbases who give their time to answer questions for free.
- adamzochowski 15y agoso it is much like google answers? http://answers.google.com/answers/ http://answers.google.com/answers/ (( imho :: google answers was a project that could have been stack exchange // 99 designs, but google never pushed it where it could have gotten to ))
- nikcub 15y agore: 4, that is because of the namespace collision between fb and tw. ie. if I signin with my fb username and then somebody signs in with a tw account with the same username
- chrisrogers 15y agoactually, I did not have to provide a username. I signed in with twitter using my email address. Perhaps the additional username was only required for Facebook connections? Between the two, Twitter is the only one with a true username identification.
- nikcub 15y agoI assume it will prompt you if there is a username collision. that is what I did when I recently implemented it. I wouldn't even show that step and assume that primary username is tw or fb username unless there was a collision there was a security hole on a site not long ago that would let you login to another account if you had the same username on one of the other logins. can't remember which site
- emeltzer 15y agoIs this really a google property? It tweets for you, follows its twitter account without telling you, and spams you as well.
- bemmu 15y agoIt's by Max Levchin's company Slide, which was acquired by Google last year. They have many apps that are popular on Facebook and were popular on MySpace.
- nowarninglabel 15y agoWhile I don't condone the actions, the part where you say "without telling you" is unfounded. I just went through the sign-up and there are clearly two checkboxes, which are checked by default: [x] "Share on Twitter [x] Follow @Prizes"
- yawniek 15y agohttps://www.starmind.com https://www.starmind.com for the masses?
- jbuchgr 15y agoI used traceroute to check where prizes.org is hosted. It runs on slide.com, which belongs to Google. The TOS also state the following: "Prizes.org is offered by Slide (part of Google Inc., located at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA, USA)" http://prizes.org/tos http://prizes.org/tos
- Kylekramer 15y agoSlide seems to be operating as an independent operation just funded by Google at this point (I mean, their other app is a group texting service that debuted on iOS and has absolutely zero integration with Google services/Google's other group texting service that just was released). While that is a interesting strategy, it really makes Google appear scattershot. Especially since Slide's products all reek of buzzwords and are almost stereotypically Silicon Valley startup products. If this is the plan, why didn't Google just invest heavily in Slide instead of acquiring them? Because right now Slide's main recent success has been creating awkward headlines for Google.
- yaix 15y agoThat's from Google? Nah. Anybody had a look at the end of the source, they used a copy-paste code for the Analytics but forgot to actually put in their own GA number. >> var _gaq = [['_setAccount', 'UA-XXXXX-X'], ['_trackPageview']];
- pbreit 15y ago"Prizes.org is offered by Slide (part of Google Inc., located at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA, USA)."
- johnx123 15y agoGoogle+ => Facebook killer Prizes.org => Quora killer
- benbeltran 15y agoI have something personal against spec work, and this site seems to be all about it. It's sad that this kind of behavior is becoming more standard. But, what can one do if not educate future professionals not to take it.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- rms 15y ago>Prizes.org is offered by Slide (part of Google Inc., located at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA, USA).
- yhlasx 15y agoI really doubt that this is Google property. If it was, the first thing to expect would be to sign up/in with my Google account.
- kennywinker 15y agoI signed up, and submitted an answer to a "contest"... it's pretty active, so I've now received like 30 emails spamming the hell out of my mailbox every time someone else submits an answer. After the first 10 I disabled everything that seemed like it would cause these emails, but no change. This sucks, please fix.
- tzury 15y agoI think google just completed an ownership transition of this domain, and the old site remain on the air http://who.is/domain_archive-org/prizes.org/ http://who.is/domain_archive-org/prizes.org/ http://web.archive.org/web/20071217101136/http://prizes.org/ http://web.archive.org/web/20071217101136/http://prizes.org/
- tcarnell 15y agoI dont believe this is from Google. Dishonest marketing from the real owner to post on HN that it is by Google...
- AlexC04 15y agoLooks pretty legit to me. WHOIS information for prizes.org : [Querying whois.publicinterestregistry.net] [whois.publicinterestregistry.net] Domain ID:D104066777-LROR Domain Name:PRIZES.ORG Created On:07-Mar-2004 19:34:50 UTC Last Updated On:18-May-2011 17:43:19 UTC Expiration Date:07-Mar-2015 19:34:50 UTC Sponsoring Registrar:MarkMonitor Inc. (R37-LROR) Status:CLIENT DELETE PROHIBITED Status:CLIENT TRANSFER PROHIBITED Status:CLIENT UPDATE PROHIBITED Status:TRANSFER PROHIBITED Registrant ID:mmr-87489 Registrant Name:DNS Admin Registrant Organization:Google Inc. Registrant Street1:1600 Amphitheatre Parkway Registrant City:Mountain View Registrant State/Province:CA Registrant Postal Code:94043 Registrant Country:US Registrant Phone:+1.6502530000 Registrant Phone Ext.: Registrant FAX:+1.6502530001 Registrant FAX Ext.: Registrant Email:dns-admin@google.com
- AlexCP 15y agoThere is no way to filter or browse by category, useless.
- ParadisoShlee_ 15y agoI want something like this for programmers. Code my Startup - $5000 ;)
- leeHS 15y agoHow do I know this is google????? Anyone?
- Gustomaximus 15y agoIs the rationale behind this prize / contestant format to make it easy to avoid tax obligation? I'm just wondering why they set it up this way rather than stating it as a freelancer format.
- rjstatic 15y agoUmmm, Google launched this? Says who?
- vaksel 15y agoweird that they are using a .org domain for a commercial service
- nicholasjbs 15y agoSomewhat off topic, but I can't get past how similar the Prizes logo looks to the Picplz logo. Load http://prizes.org/ http://prizes.org/ and http://picplz.com http://picplz.com in tabs next to each other and compare their favicons.
- mancjew 15y agoGoogle does in fact own the domain... http://www.dotweekly.com/google-obtains-prizes-org-domain-name?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DotWeekly+%28Dot+Weekly%29&utm_content=FaceBook http://www.dotweekly.com/google-obtains-prizes-org-domain-na...
- drinkwhat 15y agoI think Google is competing with Amazon Mechanical Turk
- shapeshed 15y agospec work is evil. avoid!
- shapeshed 15y agospec work is evil. avoid!
- incorrigible 15y agoGoogle didn't launch prizes.org; Slide did.
- simonk 15y agoWhich is a division of Google.
- motters 15y agoIf it requires you to log in with Facebook, that's a red flag right there.
- blake8086 15y agoThis puts me in an interesting position... I launched this exact same product a few months ago with http://www.code4cheap.com/ http://www.code4cheap.com/ (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2506706 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2506706). What should I do?
- mnml_ 15y agoSlide made it, Google owns slide. Slide launched it, Google didn't. Techcrunch is just using that as a headline to bring trafic.