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Show HN: Opp.io – Meeting Minutes Made Useful
- bujatt 12y agoHey, I am one of the guys behind this. Would love to hear your feedback on the landing page of our upcoming beta.
- vdaniuk 12y agoHey, I love your take on meeting minutes and subsequent collaborative task manager. I feel that your project would benefit significantly from identifying a niche and a customer segment that is most sympathetic to your user experience. Perhaps a "Succinct Team Messaging for Developers" or a tongue-in-cheek "Meeting Minutes DSL" would be a message more inline with a general feel of the app. At least special symbols in your meeting texts demos give a strong programming language vibe. If you are a meeting minutes app made first and foremost by engineers and previewed on HN, you really should think about paying more attention to your early adopters -- programmers, hackers and engineers. Just a customer development thought.
- ogig 12y agoThe page works nicely, the video shows what you offer using the precise amount of my time. What feels strange is that the UI you show in the video is not the same as the one that appears below, in the outlined iphones. My mind had to stop and guess; "ok, this is the same thing i watched in the vid". Overall great job on the page, and the product looks interesting too. Wish you luck.
- FlyingAvatar 12y agoI am really excited that you are working on this. I began working on an app extremely similar to this (down to the Twitter/IRC like notation) due to my own frustration with the inefficiency of taking meeting notes. I never finished the prototype, but I'll share my ideas that I felt were important: * Make integration with outside parties easy (i.e. Don't force everyone in the meeting to use the app to get the benefits.) Allow me to add aliases to meeting member's e-mail addresses (i.e. @joe = joe@example.com) Allow me to e-mail a link to the minutes when the meeting is over to all parties. * Scheduling I should be able to send calendar invites to participants of previous meetings / define recurring meetings. If I open up the app it should know what meeting I am in by my schedule. * Continuity Many of my meetings are recurring meetings. At today's meeting, I want to review the open/closed items from the previous meeting. Though I still want a way to delineate what happened in today's meeting. * Self-hostable option For legal / contractual / paranoia reasons, I may need to keep my data in-house. For several of the groups in my company, a cloud-hosted app is a deal breaker. * Plugins I should be able to integrate the user directory with my company's LDAP server. I should be able to promote tasks to real tickets in my project management software. I should be able to reference items from other meetings. Anyway, good luck with your app!
- bujatt 12y agoThanks sharing your ideas, FlyingAvatar. I comment on some of them: - Emailing will be automatic, people receive the memo via email and also access the full document via a link. - We thought on importing last week's items, and have options to bulk hide the items done etc. - Data privacy is definitely a concern of organizations, especially larger ones. That's a hard nut to crack.
- matthewrhoden1 12y agoMy first thought was, can I use this on a computer. My second thought was, how I'm going to get others in my office to use it that maybe don't want another account. I really like the idea, because nobody takes meeting minutes besides me and I'm the only one who follows up on them.
- bujatt 12y agoYes, the current version will run in a browser, and only optimised for mobile and tablet. The cool thing is that you don't need to get others to install anything just their email address. I am happy to see that this resonates with you well.
- mtm 12y agoI really like the "markdown" aspect of this. Trello and Hipchat integration would be awesome (actually, how about a nice plugin system or a way to fire off REST calls (and receive them as well))
- bujatt 12y agoThanks mtm. We are thinking on integration and Trello'd be one of first choice. If anyone has other recommendations, please share.
- mentat 12y agoIt's nice but I had similar questions as other as to whether it's usable from a web browser. Google Apps integration even just for auth would be key to using it at my company. Apparently I'll have to wait for the 70,000 people ahead of me in the invite process though.
- endeavor 12y agoIt looks like a lot of the functionality is only shown in the video, and it moves pretty fast. I wish I could pause it.
- cpcarey 12y agoLike others in the thread, I'm also impressed with how quickly and clearly the landing page video demonstrated the basic functionality. I think you hit the sweet spot with the simplicity of the functionality shown. As you add features in the future that you'd also like to demonstrate in a video (such as calendar events, integration, etc. as suggested in the thread), just be wary of adding them all to one video and consider separate videos if they take long enough. At that point I think an A/B test would be a good idea. But back to the present, I think the current video is great!
- fortpoint 12y agoInteresting idea. Speaking as someone who manages a bunch of folks I don't find assigning action items w/o due dates very helpful. Is there a facility to specify a date?
- bujatt 12y agoYes, there will definitely be.
- steven777400 12y agoThe landing page is fantastic. I know exactly what this product does, and I can see where it would fit into our organizational needs, all without any effort on my part (I didn't even need to scroll, although there is more detail when I did).
- humpt 12y agoThe product is sure awesome, but since you're discussing the design of the homepage, I think the typography might need some more work. And if you look on [this page](http://www.opp.io/About http://www.opp.io/About), the color palette as well :/
- avree 12y agoAll that stuff is subjective. Seems fine to me, wouldn't really matter unless it was turning away users. I do wish their logo worked @2x, the entire site has retina-versions for images except the logo which causes it to look grainy on my Mac.
- bujatt 12y agoHi Humpt, thanks for the comment. We will definitely iterate on the design including typography, colours in the mockup, color/whitespace balance etc. For now, most important to us is that people get the concept of the product.
- teh_klev 12y agoI agree, it's one of the first landing pages in a long time that explained within 30 seconds or so exactly what the product does. Very well done.
- abengoam 12y agoOh wow. I was in the early stages of creating something exactly like this this myself - looks good guys!
- thenipper 12y agoThis product looks pretty cool. I think i'd want a way to then take this an export the todos into an already existing workflow. Say into Trello or Outlook etc.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- shamsulbuddy 12y agoYou have hit the pain point ..Very useful app ..great job
- taprun 12y agoI get the feeling that this product would be really good for people who are moving about quite a bit - delivery folks, plumbers, surveyors, etc. Are you going to call out specific types of people who would be best served by this? Also, minor grammatical nitpick: "LESS MESSAGES" should probably be "FEWER MESSAGES".
- bujatt 12y agoHey taprun, thanks for spotting the typo. We tried to adapt the popular quote "LESS IS MORE", popularized by Mies van der Rohe, to the given context. Any idea how to say this? "LESS MESSAGING IS MORE" (sorry for the capitals) Regarding your question about our target user segment. Currently we target coordinators, project managers and workteams but haven't identified yet a more narrow segment within that.
- donaldguy 12y agoThis is a good idea and I'd like to use it, but it needs presentational work for adoption, I suspect. In particular, I don't think that people without a software background are going to be comfortable with the abundance of syntactic sigils. Even in the twitter-native world, I think it will makes the product seem intimidating and un-natural (at least at first). This is especially a concern because the value of using them is not immediately clear (excepting @person).
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- trumbitta2 12y agoHello, Oppio is the italian word for Opium, one of the most dangerous drugs out there. Just thought you'd wanted to know.
- collyw 12y agoIs opium that dangerous? I would have thought that tobacco or alcohol were far worse. edit: Wow, that was an extremely quick down vote. Didn't even get round to posting my follow up with a bit of evidence. Drugs are bad, m'kay.
- collyw 12y agohttp://www.bbc.com/news/uk-11660210 http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-11660210 Doesn't mention opium, but a quick google says that it takes 10 kilos of opium to make a kilo of heroin, which admittedly is near the top of the list. There are lots of prescription drugs based on opium, no?
- jbm 12y agoI didn't mod you down, but it is bad. Opium is probably single-handedly responsible for the harsh penalties for drug use in East Asia. This article comes to mind: http://www.thefix.com/content/confessions-opium-addict-drug-paraphernalia00098?page=all http://www.thefix.com/content/confessions-opium-addict-drug-... And this book: http://www.amazon.com/Opium-Fiend-Century-Slave-Addiction/dp/0345517830 http://www.amazon.com/Opium-Fiend-Century-Slave-Addiction/dp...
- bujatt 12y agohey trumbitta2, yes we are aware. We actually found out this after we got the domain and... just laughed. We say if we fail we sell the domain for high price.
- trumbitta2 12y agoThat's the right attitude :) Also, I wander who downvoted me for this...
- erichurkman 12y agoIf the mini demo on the home page is accurate, be careful with those colors - light red & green specifically. Full protanopia is present in approximately 1-2% of males. Deuteranopia (less severe than protanopia) is present in some form in up to 5% of males of certain European descent. For a reference, this is an approximation of what light red & light green look like for someone with protanopia: http://i.imgur.com/EGSlsmB.png http://i.imgur.com/EGSlsmB.png
- bujatt 12y agothanks Eric, this was new to me!
- g_borgulya 12y agoWhat about using icons instead of colors?
- bujatt 12y agoMight work but as icons doesn't offer the kind of visual effect that allows you to oversee 10+ tasks with a glimpse, I would suggest using them both.
- kenshi 12y agoI think the demo on the landing page should be in the form of meeting minutes, rather than someone messaging a load of tasks to their (I assume) direct reports. Why? Because the feeling the demo evoked for me was: "Uh oh. This looks like a micro-managers wet dream". So rather than just have "@John please !phone client" perhaps the demo would itemise the meeting minutes with: "@John said he would !phone client and discuss requirements". Perhaps this is simply because I have had the unpleasant experience of working for panic-driven micromanagers before. But I think you really want to make sure your landing page is resonating with "Awesome - this is going to make my life easier" vs. "What pandora's box of hell will this tool unleash in my organization and work life". Product definitely looks useful though, and the above comments are about making sure you present it in its best light. Good luck!
- rurounijones 12y agoAgrees, I would definitely change the examples on the site so that they do not use the imperative form. It kind of distracts, I have never seen meeting minutes written like that.
- bujatt 12y agoHi rurounijones, you're right in pointing out the important difference between imperative vs. descriptive form. In our application we intend to accommodate both - hence the inline syntax within the free text. So you could write in a very succinct way "@John please !phone client" like when you drop over a quick note on Post-It to your colleague-friend sitting next table. But you could also send as a more polite request, something like "@john, can you be so kind to !phone the client". Or what you just wrote "@John said he would !phone client and discuss requirements". These all refer to the same action: John should phone the client. P.S. In the video we were of course limited by keeping the text as short as possible so it remains legible.
- bujatt 12y agoThanks kenshi for your comment, we're trying our bests!
- CWIZO 12y agoAs a non native speaker, I had to look up the definition of succinct, which was the very first thing I saw on the page. And I consider myself a very good English speaker. So you might want to change that word to something a broader audience would understand.
- bujatt 12y agoHi CWIZO, you are not the first one. Actually this is the most common feedback we receive. We are iterating on this.
- ams6110 12y agoYou say meeting minutes made useful but the header on the website is "Succinct Team Messaging." I actually didn't see anything that looked like meeting minutes presented anywhere. Was hoping this would take minutes from Word as 95% of secretaries will use, somehow extract action items, and then help communicate/track them. Everything shown here I would just use email to manange. It's not outdated, it works and it's an LCD. I run a small nonprofit organization and was hoping this might be helpful because action item followup is a pain point. But I wouldn't use this.
- pi-err 12y agoAgreed. The demo is a top-down management wet dream. A meeting where people get instructed in details to do specific tasks? No deadline, no ambiguity? Those guys never attended a meeting. UX wise, I'm not ok with the "red/orange/green" codes and "fail/done" tags. Even for a small startup, communication is not that blunt, for a reason. Red in the demo seems to stand for postponed, canceled, rejected or badly executed. Yet "red" means bad in most cultural contexts. The color code implies too much and would really harm any group using such a basic code.
- bujatt 12y agoHi pi-err, you make really good points. Also, if every team member could assign tasks, send requests and questions using this syntax, would that change your perception of this being a top-down management tool? Because our intention is to build a tool that allows a more horizontal communication among team members - but that's more difficult to visualize in a single video. We are also aware of the cultural-contextual association of colours. This is one thing we are actually struggling with. While colors are a very easy and effective way to communicate status of tasks, especially to give a quick overview of many tasks - they have severe limitations, just like you say, red evoking associations with something as being "bad".
- bujatt 12y agoDeadlines are on our roadmap. What do you mean by "no ambiguity"?
- 12y ago
- rubyn00bie 12y agoLooks awesome! I've been wanting something similar to this for a while now. I wish there weren't 69,772 people ahead of me... (first world problems) :( or at least some way to gauge what that means.
- omnivore 12y agoWe surely need this at my large government bureaucracy of an organization. Thanks for sharing.
- malloreon 12y agoIt should be "Fewer messages are more." You use "less" when the item in question is not measured in discrete units - "there is less rain today than yesterday." You use "fewer" when the item in question is measured in discrete units - "there are fewer raindrops today than yesterday." Messages are discrete units.
- polm23 12y agoYou're welcome to believe that nonsense if you like but please don't perpetuate it. http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/myl/languagelog/archives/003775.html http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/myl/languagelog/archives/003775.ht... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fewer_vs._less http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fewer_vs._less
- jtheory 12y agoI'd recommend they find different wording. There are plenty of people out there who "know" the less/fewer grammar rule, and those people are going to find this landing page a bit unprofessional. And I'm not a grammar prescriptivist, but "Less messages are more" still sounds wrong to my ear -- it's based on the phrase "Less is more", but putting "messages" in there forces the "is" to "are", and that clashes unpleasantly. My brain wants to fix it to "Less messages is more", which is then also bad. "Fewer messages are more" isn't any better -- we lose the "less is more" echo (which was the whole point!), and it has a whiff of "my English teacher told me it should be 'fewer'." :) Alternatives (none perfect, but better): - Just use "Less is more" as the heading (and possibly tweak the copy below to start with the word "messages"). - Change "messages" to some non-plural word so you can preserve the "is" -- there may not be a good option here, though ("communication"? ugh). - Just toss it, and capture the idea in some other phrase. "Don't drown in messages", "No message flood", or whatever, then you can even put *"Less is more" when it comes to messages" in the copy below. [edit: dumb errors in a post about grammar and word choice tend to backfire]
- bujatt 12y agoWe just changed it for the simpler: "LESS IS MORE".
- itazula 12y agoI see that Sarah says that "As you may know ... " so presumably everybody is on the same page to start, but going forward it seems that only Sarah has a holistic view of the situation. Is this not the case? And are dependencies handled? For example, in a more complicated case, should Task A be done before Task B, etc.?
- bujatt 12y agoThe free text editor allows you to enter any information to bring the team to the same page. Deadlines and dependencies are obviously on our roadmap. :)
- shanth 12y agohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TJTbRw4ri8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TJTbRw4ri8
- mbesto 12y agoSorry to be that guy, but this clearly doesn't follow the Show HN guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html "If your work isn't ready for people to try out yet, please don't put "Show HN" in the title. Once it's ready, come back and share it then. For example, blog posts, email signups, and fundraisers can't be tried out, so they don't count as Show HNs."
- bujatt 12y agoHi mbesto, I have to admit you are right. I was simply too excited to share the landing page. Actually you can try it out http://opp.io/app http://opp.io/app but there is no direct link to it from the front page. (It is less functional than in the demo video.)
- mbesto 12y agoNo worries - looks really cool nevertheless. Looking forward to see how it progresses.
- alphydan 12y agoHow is it different from the old "The Deadline"? (a startup from the now defunct http://hackfwd.com/ http://hackfwd.com/ which has been trying this for a few years). They changed their name to: https://www.telety.pe/ https://www.telety.pe/
- bujatt 12y agoalphydan, good point. Teletype and Twoodo are most similar to our app. Our approach is somewhat different, more focusing on email compatibility, on the free text editor experience and more systemic. (We'll post about that later.)
- romerro 12y agostill loving it!
- vjvj 12y agoThat demo video gets the concept across very neatly and succinctly.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- sunforged 12y agotypo in your meta appears during social shares: "Welcome to opp.io, the actionable messaging platform. Stop waisting time on emails"