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Show HN: My bold attempt to become a millionaire while trying to solve a problem

7 points by enormace 14y ago

typpo 14y ago
Reminds me of the million dollar homepage, which succeeded in raising a million dollars: http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/ http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/
- enormace 14y ago
  Yes it's a similar take on making a million dollars. I just thought there must be another way / pattern of getting to the same figure while also attempting to solve the issue of discovering apps.
superqd 14y ago
The site says its the "ultimate" iPhone app discovery destination. I wasn't certain how it was supposed to help you discover apps, because at first it just looked like a very long list, which isn't very helpful. Then I saw a filter, but the filter only includes a small selection of categories. That's not very helpful either. I'm not sure what the problem is that you are trying to solve, and what would motivate someone to purchase an icon on your page. If it was a viral site, then certainly the eyeballs will entice some to buy space. However, the site isn't a destination, and isn't novel enough to pull tons of potential "real" customers (if most people visiting the site are potential advertisers, it's not very valuable to advertisers, etc). So that means your site needs to actually be better at app discovery than Apple's iTunes. But it's not, or at least I couldn't figure out how it was. Is there some other mechanism for finding apps that you provide? If you are trying to replicate the novelty of the million dollar home page, I don't think it will work in this case. Do you already have tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of visitors to the site? If not, why buy?
- enormace 14y ago
  Thanks for the feedback. I thought I had all the categories as listed on iTunes so I'll look into it again. And you are right in saying why buy if the site doesn't have many visitors and I guess that's the hardest part in getting it out there. It might not be novel enough to pull thousands of customers but I just thought it wouldn't hurt to try the idea out.
  - superqd 14y ago
    I think you may want to reconsider the URL as well. I know good domain names are hard to come by, but million dollar home page was a wonderful name. But only1414apps doesn't roll off the tongue very well, and doesn't stick in the brain very well either. Since it isn't very catchy, it will have a hard time enticing non-advertisers to visit. Just my two cents.
    - enormace 14y ago
      Again thanks for the feedback. Yep, I hear you and these are the names I had initially: "appiconswarm.com", and "1414apps.com" The reason why I included "only" was to create urgency and the word "apps" in todays world normally means an app on a phone... And there are 1,414 app icons available so I think it's the best I could come up with :-) Heck, I even purchased only1414androidapps.com just in case :-)
      - superqd 14y ago
        Good luck.
loceng 14y ago
The pricing increases far too quickly.
- enormace 14y ago
  This might help in 'the sooner I buy, the cheaper it'll be'. It's also easier on the eye to see what's going on and that the price increases incrementally by $1. Also, if there were more icons it means more images to load and slower loading times.
slajax 14y ago
Pretty funny. Reminds me of the million dollar homepage guy who sold pixels. Good job.
- enormace 14y ago
  Thanks!
buraksarica 14y ago
The ~$700 blocks are in the middle of the grid and those can be reached after a 5 scroll in the page. And unfortunately they won't be positively affected by grid flip. The best bargain is the cheapest ones IMO, i may give 20 bucks which will stay there until you reach 250.000.
- enormace 14y ago
  True, the ones in the middle really won't be affected by the grid flip. And thanks for reading / scrolling all the way down to the bottom to find out about the grid flip :-) The best bargain is to get in quick while it's still early days and your app will by displayed for a while longer because I'm sure reaching the $250,000 mark won't happen overnight. Also, the 'early adopters' will be featured on the hall of fame page here: http://only1414apps.com/hall-of-fame.html http://only1414apps.com/hall-of-fame.html Again, thanks for reading about my post and visiting the site.
rartichoke 14y ago
Looks like more than 1 person went out of their way to skip the $13 slot. Are people really so afraid of 13 that they would pay more money for a worse spot just to avoid it? It jumps from $12 to $14 + $15 + $16 at the time of this comment.
- enormace 14y ago
  I find it strange as well. Blocks $1 and $14 were purchased by the same app developer as they wanted presumably the top left and top right position when I first launched the site. Ever since then it's been going up incrementally. I think what happened was that the app developer who purchased block 15 was indicating to me that he might purchase block 16 AND block 29 and 30 so that the same icon would stand out (4 icons grouped together). This never eventuated, so it appears to the eye if scanned quickly that block 16 was the next one in line which was subsequently purchased by another app developer. It's that or 13 is an unlucky number for some. Especially if purchased on a Friday. :-)

7 points by enormace 14y ago

typpo 14y ago

Reminds me of the million dollar homepage, which succeeded in raising a million dollars: http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/ http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/

enormace 14y ago
Yes it's a similar take on making a million dollars. I just thought there must be another way / pattern of getting to the same figure while also attempting to solve the issue of discovering apps.

superqd 14y ago

The site says its the "ultimate" iPhone app discovery destination. I wasn't certain how it was supposed to help you discover apps, because at first it just looked like a very long list, which isn't very helpful. Then I saw a filter, but the filter only includes a small selection of categories. That's not very helpful either. I'm not sure what the problem is that you are trying to solve, and what would motivate someone to purchase an icon on your page. If it was a viral site, then certainly the eyeballs will entice some to buy space. However, the site isn't a destination, and isn't novel enough to pull tons of potential "real" customers (if most people visiting the site are potential advertisers, it's not very valuable to advertisers, etc). So that means your site needs to actually be better at app discovery than Apple's iTunes. But it's not, or at least I couldn't figure out how it was. Is there some other mechanism for finding apps that you provide? If you are trying to replicate the novelty of the million dollar home page, I don't think it will work in this case. Do you already have tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of visitors to the site? If not, why buy?

enormace 14y ago
Thanks for the feedback. I thought I had all the categories as listed on iTunes so I'll look into it again. And you are right in saying why buy if the site doesn't have many visitors and I guess that's the hardest part in getting it out there. It might not be novel enough to pull thousands of customers but I just thought it wouldn't hurt to try the idea out.
- superqd 14y ago
  I think you may want to reconsider the URL as well. I know good domain names are hard to come by, but million dollar home page was a wonderful name. But only1414apps doesn't roll off the tongue very well, and doesn't stick in the brain very well either. Since it isn't very catchy, it will have a hard time enticing non-advertisers to visit. Just my two cents.
  - enormace 14y ago
    Again thanks for the feedback. Yep, I hear you and these are the names I had initially: "appiconswarm.com", and "1414apps.com" The reason why I included "only" was to create urgency and the word "apps" in todays world normally means an app on a phone... And there are 1,414 app icons available so I think it's the best I could come up with :-) Heck, I even purchased only1414androidapps.com just in case :-)
    - superqd 14y ago
      Good luck.

loceng 14y ago

The pricing increases far too quickly.

enormace 14y ago
This might help in 'the sooner I buy, the cheaper it'll be'. It's also easier on the eye to see what's going on and that the price increases incrementally by $1. Also, if there were more icons it means more images to load and slower loading times.

slajax 14y ago

Pretty funny. Reminds me of the million dollar homepage guy who sold pixels. Good job.

enormace 14y ago
Thanks!

buraksarica 14y ago

The ~$700 blocks are in the middle of the grid and those can be reached after a 5 scroll in the page. And unfortunately they won't be positively affected by grid flip. The best bargain is the cheapest ones IMO, i may give 20 bucks which will stay there until you reach 250.000.

enormace 14y ago
True, the ones in the middle really won't be affected by the grid flip. And thanks for reading / scrolling all the way down to the bottom to find out about the grid flip :-) The best bargain is to get in quick while it's still early days and your app will by displayed for a while longer because I'm sure reaching the $250,000 mark won't happen overnight. Also, the 'early adopters' will be featured on the hall of fame page here: http://only1414apps.com/hall-of-fame.html http://only1414apps.com/hall-of-fame.html Again, thanks for reading about my post and visiting the site.

rartichoke 14y ago

Looks like more than 1 person went out of their way to skip the $13 slot. Are people really so afraid of 13 that they would pay more money for a worse spot just to avoid it? It jumps from $12 to $14 + $15 + $16 at the time of this comment.

enormace 14y ago
I find it strange as well. Blocks $1 and $14 were purchased by the same app developer as they wanted presumably the top left and top right position when I first launched the site. Ever since then it's been going up incrementally. I think what happened was that the app developer who purchased block 15 was indicating to me that he might purchase block 16 AND block 29 and 30 so that the same icon would stand out (4 icons grouped together). This never eventuated, so it appears to the eye if scanned quickly that block 16 was the next one in line which was subsequently purchased by another app developer. It's that or 13 is an unlucky number for some. Especially if purchased on a Friday. :-)