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Ask HN: Can I visit your startup in SF?
Hi there,
My name is Max, I'm a cofounder at Kera, and we're from Toronto. We started Kera to teach the world how to use software.
Cameron (one of my cofounders) and I are coming to SF the week after next (Oct 22-26) so we can make new friends and learn how companies like yours are educating and onboarding new users. We're also looking for advice about building our startup. If you're doing something interesting, have an awesome company culture, or just like hanging with Canadians, we'd love to meet you.
Any referrals or introductions are more than welcome.
You can find out more about Kera here (http://kera.io), and we can be found at @maxcameron & @camwest on twitter.
Thanks in advance,
Max
edit: my email is max@kera.io
- taigeair 14y agogood luck guys!
- maxcameron 14y agoThanks Taige!
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- maxcameron 14y agoWish we could stop by in Atlanta - it's not too far from Toronto.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- jjmanton 14y agoI am from Atlanta and I dont even know most of the startups around here. Seems like there might be a need for the startup map.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- mstank 14y agoWow, great product. Any examples of companies using it or are you still in the early stages?
- maxcameron 14y agoHey, The short answer is: yes. Feel free to check out http://verold.com http://verold.com, http://ptable.com http://ptable.com, and http://happytables.com http://happytables.com to see Kera in production. We also have some really cool case studies in the works with more "high profile" startups in Toronto. That being said, we're still a very early-stage company.
- petercooper 14y agoThere have been quite a few threads like this on HN over the years (including one I made :-)). I wonder if there's some way of formalizing or aggregating the concept of visiting other companies, it seems there's an audience for it.
- maxcameron 14y agoYeah no kidding. We're already staying at one of our customer's houses while we're there. So there's a ton of support for visiting startups.
- rabidsnail 14y agoDidn't there used to be a tour thing after every Startup School?
- jaredsohn 14y ago>used to be a tour thing There has been a YC distributed open house at least each of the past couple of years. Haven't heard if there will be one this year or not.
- hugs 14y ago"Some way of formalizing or aggregating the concept"... like StartupCrawl? :-) http://startupcrawl.com/ http://startupcrawl.com/ (My startup, Sauce Labs, participated in the crawl in 2009 -- it coincided with RubyConf that year, so there was a lot of flow-over traffic from RubyConf go-ers.)
- lauraku 14y agoHmm perhaps if this were more than once a year?
- camwest 14y agoPeter, aren't you exactly the type of man for this job? =)
- mnicole 14y agoThis is exactly the tool I've been waiting for; great work and good luck!
- maxcameron 14y agoThanks for the kind words. Are you in SF?
- mnicole 14y agoPortland, sorry.
- reiz 14y agoHi Max. My Name is Robert Reiz. I am the founder of http://www.versioneye.com http://www.versioneye.com. That is my second Start-Up. I am coming at the same time to San Francisco, from Germany. I like your product, I like Canadians and of course I like Beer :-) I will contact you.
- maxcameron 14y agoHey Robert. That's awesome. Looking forward to hearing from you.
- zocoi 14y agoCheckout http://openco.us/ http://openco.us/, they are doing a kickoff today where you can spend an hour visiting a startup in their list, from airbnb to zynga and beyond
- maxcameron 14y agoLooks like we're missing it :( Bummer.
- hockeybias 14y agoIf you ever stop by Minneapolis, let me know! ...If you are really fromToronto you'll like my site http://HockeyBias.com http://HockeyBias.com ! :) The layout is a combo of DrudgeReport/ScriptingNews. The site tracks hockey news from September through the last Stanley cup game each year. Charlie@HockeyBias.com
- dsowers 14y agoYour software is really cool. Just wondering why you haven't completed your website yet. The "how it works" just takes you to a google doc. Anyway, best of luck. If you want to venture to Lake Tahoe, I'd be happy to grab a beer.
- camwest 14y agoWell to be honest we were building our marketing website and realized that we were better off to just put it in a Google Doc since we can iterate faster on it. We literally update it in realtime while users watch which is a lot better than the marketing site refine/deploy process. Once things stabilize a little more we'll extract the information into a great marketing website. Probably in the next 6 weeks.
- tomblomfield 14y agoThis is an awesome tool. How did I not know about it?!
- maxcameron 14y agoIt isn't really something people search for. It's going to be word of mouth until our category solidifies. What are you working on these days? Max
- stefanobernardi 14y agoMax, Kera.io looks awesome, congratulations. Happy to have you guys visit, and we'd love to talk about using the product too. We're in SOMA. stefano ]a-t[ betable.com
- maxcameron 14y agoThank you so much for the kind words. I'll follow up with an email shortly. Max
- scylla 14y agoCome stop by. http://www.appdirect.com http://www.appdirect.com We're based in San Francisco but founded by two Canadians.
- maxcameron 14y agoWant me to bring you a bottle of CC or a double double or some ketchup chips? No joke.
- scylla 14y agoOur CEO says CC! Drop by anyways :)
- SirPalmerston 14y agoLove the Ketchup chips. <3 Edit: From Vancover...
- maxcameron 14y agoDone and done.
- froseph 14y agoDrop by whitetruffle ( https://www.whitetruffle.com/ https://www.whitetruffle.com/ ). We're located in Rocketspace coworking space. @froseph or joseph@whitetruffle.com
- maxcameron 14y agoHey Joseph, Thank you so much. I hear Rocketspace has some wicked things going on. I'll email you!
- revicon 14y agoHey Max, stop by Gigwalk when you're down here, we're over on 4th and Bryant. I'll pop you an email. -Matt
- maxcameron 14y agoI'll gigwalk myself over to your office no problem. Talk soon Matt.
- enjo 14y agoNot California, but if you find yourself in Denver/Boulder I'd love to show you around:)
- camwest 14y agoMax is going to be in Boulder for Defrag. Are you going?
- Xorlev 14y agoFullContact will be at Defrag, we could probably finagle something if you wanted to visit. :)
- maxcameron 14y agoThat would be amazing. Can you email me at max@kera.io?
- bernardom 14y agoVery, very cool startup. For us non-technical folk, you might wish to add a section to your how-to explaining how Kera.io would interact with proprietary data; for example, if our app happens to be financial, would you be able to see any of it? Or is the script hosted on our end? (This may be obvious to a dev, but not to me, and therefore caused me to send this to our devs to ask)
- camwest 14y agoThe script is hosted on your end and data is pulled from our servers to yours, we don't store any personal information or anything on our side. Edit: I'll update the FAQ
- volandovengo 14y agoKera looks great! Is it currently an idea that you're trying to validate or are you currently coding it up and waiting to launch?
- camwest 14y agoWe've done a lot of validation and have a bunch of people doing experiments with it. We can chat more about it if you want to reach out cameron@kera.io
- volandovengo 14y agogreat - i'll shoot you an email.
- briancary 14y agoHey Max - we'd love to meet you guys in person and have you check out our sweet office and awesome company (ReTargeter). How about Friday the 26th?
- BrentUnderwood 14y agoAwesome company, and awesome dude, I'll attest. Hey Brian!
- maxcameron 14y agoyeah, Brian's awesome. He signed up for Kera a few months ago so we've been chatting for some time.
- maxcameron 14y agoWhatup Brian - for sure I want to meet up. I heard Taige's talking with Samir and making things happen. I'm leaving on Friday afternoon - so Thursday would be better. I'll reach out via email.
- jaequery 14y agowhere do i sign up to invest?
- camwest 14y agoUmmm email money transfer cameron@kera.io? =)
- maxcameron 14y agoIf you're up for a coffee, let me know. max@kera.io
- arram 14y agoYou're welcome to join us for lunch at ZeroCater. Email in profile.
- maxcameron 14y agoAwesome - i'll email you this weekend. How is zerocater not in Toronto yet?
- meanderingman 14y agoI miss you guys. You where awesome office neighbors.
- stevewilhelm 14y agoWe are a ZeroCater client. They are awesome.
- ultrasaurus 14y agoMax, I'll shoot you an email, PagerDuty is originally a YYZ startup too and we're at 2nd and Bryant in SOMA.
- maxcameron 14y agoLooking forward to hearing from you. Lemme know if you need anything from up here. Ketchup chips etc.
- tatianajosephy 14y agoWe'd love to see you at CrowdFlower. Email forthcoming.
- porterhaney 14y agoWill you be bringing poutine?
- maxcameron 14y agoIf you need it, I will bring it.
- jaymstr 14y agoDefinitely welcome to come visit LaunchRock. I'm jameson@launchrock.com.
- jaymstr 14y agoAnd really dig Kera by the way. Could be interesting for us.
- maxcameron 14y agoThat would be amazing. Emailing you now.
- kloncks 14y agoWe do payments (https://www.ribbon.co https://www.ribbon.co) and would love to show you our offices in SOMA. hany@ribbon.co
- maxcameron 14y agoThanks so much Hany, I really appreciate it. I'll email you asap.
- SwaroopH 14y agoCome visit Startup House (5th and Harrison) to meet us (http://attico.us http://attico.us) and various other startups.
- maxcameron 14y agoSounds good! I'll be there.
- larrys 14y agoI find this entire approach fascinating. That someone can post this on HN and get a bunch of invites back. Does doing something like this scale? What if everybody just decided to post "hey I'm coming to SF is there a place for me to crash" or "hey I'm coming to NYC anyone want to have coffee?" or "I have a problem writing perl..." Since there are companies that you are trying to reach, and you must have some idea of the type of company you want to reach, why not put some effort into doing something other than the obvious easiest thing which is to post an "Ask HN" and see who bites? (For the record I wouldn't feel the same way if a top commenter who spends much time on HN made a similar request because at least they have put time and effort into HN (and I don't consider my karma as anywhere near that point for the record.)
- SwaroopH 14y agowell, looks like this just got bumped off from the frontpage.
- camwest 14y agoThis is definitely valid and I don't think our approach scales. It was something a friend recommended and we tried it. HN has an upvote system for a reason.
- maxcameron 14y agoI'm reminded of a story about pablo picasso. It ended something like... “My dear lady, it took me 30 years to do that.”
- charleshaanel 14y agoWhy not congratulate OP for his initiative. The fact that som many people are responding so positively gives new members of the community (like myself) a wonderful impression of how helpful people are here. Look how many people are pitching in to help this person without any expectation of return. Also, this is yet one community. You have no idea who all else this guy knows and by meeting with whoever responds here, they will gain from it. I'd like to point you to a Reid Hoffman article which discusses the power of connecting with people from various networks: http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/01/24/reid-hoffman-linkedin-startup-you/ http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/01/24/reid-hoffman-linkedin... (special attention to the bit on "The diversity of weak ties" The fact that he's not a top commenter is even more inspiring. It shows that if someone has a good concept, takes initiative and quells any fear that "oh I'm not a big guy/girl on HN,I can't be that audacious" - well that person will get results. Reminds me of Geothe's timeless words, "...boldness has genius, power and magic in it".
- ishake 14y agoOriginally from Toronto myself. Part of a startup called Insight (YC). We're based in Palo Alto. Happy to grab a coffee when you guys are here.
- maxcameron 14y agoThat would be awesome. What's a good way to get ahold of you?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- gobengo 14y agoCome hang out with us (me?) at Livefyre. 3rd/Market downtown. ben@livefyre.com
- maxcameron 14y agoHey Ben - thanks so much. I'll send you an email shortly. Max