Show HN: "Dropbox for Wi-Fi" (instabridge.com)
Since the server just went down:
Since the site is having problems:
Vimeo video: http://vimeo.com/54228044
Android app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.instabridg...
Blog: http://blog.instabridge.com/
86 comments
[ 4.9 ms ] story [ 150 ms ] threadApart from trying to solve the usability issues with wifi, we also support sharing of hotspots with the entire Instabridge community. This is intended for cafés, restaurants, and so on.
We've had a short beta run in the Nordics, and launched globally a couple of days ago at LAUNCH 2013 (where we won the "Best International Startup" prize. Yay, us!). I'm a long time HN reader and have seen many "Show HN" posts during the years. I'm really eager to read what you guys have to say, both the good and the bad.
Scramble to fix it before you drop off the front page!
I'd rather use my phone than a credit card to pay, but finding Google/Square Wallet, opening the app, authorizing the payment, and (for Google) tapping the device are way more work than fishing out my credit card and swiping it. Needing someone to download the app to get on my WiFi vs typing in a 10 digit number feels similar. You're trying to alleviate a minor pain with technology, but at least for the first use, your way is more painful.
I'd like to see you succeed, because I like the idea of community-distributed WEPs and not having to ask people to get on WiFi, but I don't know how you get past the installation barrier to build that community.
Also, how does the tablet aspect work? If I need to get my tablet on WiFi, I probably don't have a cell connection for it to make the call to lookup the WEP. Do you send it from my phone over Bluetooth? Do you periodically sync the list of known-WEPs between devices when they both have signal?
We also support community Wi-Fi hotspots so that you can get access to Wi-Fi wherever you go.
Right now the syncing of passwords between tablets and smartphones is done over Wi-Fi, so the tablet would have to be connected to Wi-Fi the first time for syncing to work.
Going forward one of the top things we'd like to add is syncing of passwords over bluetooth so that if you have a smartphone that's connected over 3G and gets access to Wi-Fi you can sync that right away to your tablet.
(By the way, typo on the frontpage: "Don't have an Andriod phone?")
It does seem like a good idea, but I'd worry about Google doing something similar inbuilt based on Google user accounts.
Here's the thing though: my Android phone doesn't need this, it's got 3G and that's generally enough so I don't go through the hassle of turning on the battery-sucking WiFi just so it can notify me of new emails a bit faster.
What does need an app like this is my laptop. Any plans for OS X / Windows / Linux clients?
Now we say that we sync passwords that's only between Android devices. I think the real killer is when we make an app your laptop that sync via bluetooth from your phone.
Great that your 3G is working so well, for some reason I always have really bad coverage and am constantly asking for the Wi-Fi password.
> Great that your 3G is working so well
Where are you at? I'm mostly running around in Germany, UK, and well-connected parts of Asia so that's probably where my bias comes from ;)
In what way has this been proven to be effective? I'm interested in both the methodology and understanding how investigating this in the Nordics might not persist elsewhere with the same results. Perhaps your experimental group has a different understanding of Dropbox than others? The comments so far seem to indicate general agreement that
Since Dropbox has no connection to syncing, sharing, and revoking WiFi credentials/access, you have created a very different product from what "Dropbox for WiFi" connotes.
Off the top of my head, you could probably get better mileage from a descriptor such as "Bump for Passwords", or even "WiFi Password Sync-n-Shareinator". Anything that accurately conveys an immediate expectation of an app that syncs, shares, and revokes WiFi access among mobile devices.
Beyond this, the app implementation, design, and workflows look awfully damn nice. Now I'd love to have this functionality available for my phone, tablet, laptops, PS3, Xbox, TV, and Blu-Ray player. Keep up the good work!
Think of other products that use the 'X for Y' device--for example, a service that markets itself as 'Facebook for Sex'. The nearly automatic connection potential users are going to make is that this service is going to have certain obvious and well-known features of Facebook--like connecting with other users, building up a list of 'friends', etc. Now, if that service was, instead, a news feed of stories about sexual subjects, I think the users would be rightly confused by the analogy not being correct. Here, they'd have been better suited using the 'Facebook-like news feed for sexual content', or something more apt. The same could be said if the service was 'Google for Philosophy'--someone is going to automatically expect a philosophy search engine, not a pair of wearable eyeglasses that help you connect your everyday experiences to greater philosophical questions.
Perhaps you'd be better served with something along the lines of "Dropbox ease-of-use for WiFi passwords", or "Dropbox-style management of WiFi passwords". Here you're able to invoke the actual Dropbox feature your sample pool was connecting to that is not communicated clearly with the original wording.
Also, the only reason I think it's worth your attention is that you're actually having to explain the analogy multiple times to commenters here beside me. That's as strong an indication you can get that the analogy isn't working. You shouldn't ever have to explain what your marketing message means to your potential users.
Again, I think it's a great-looking product. Very well designed and executed, and the interaction simplicity is the real killer here (as you're obviously trying to communicate).
Anyway, still love the idea, but until I can use it without facebook (or any other "special" network for that matter) it just isn't happening.
But going forward we'd like to add even more social graphs: LinkedIn, Twitter, G+ etc.
Vimeo video: http://vimeo.com/54228044
Android app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.instabridg...
Blog (which seems to be working): http://blog.instabridge.com/
And text-only Google cache the above came from, which has a couple other links, but not much to show: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:www.ins...
But good point. I'll update the Google Play description.
Do you anything that has to do with shared cloud storage or collaboration? If not, just don't compare to Dropbox just to try to seem disruptive or give yourself an 'air' of success even before launch.
Also: Frontpage explains nothing about what the service does. I would try boiling it down to a few short bullets or an effective one-liner instead of leaning on people knowing what dropbox does and somehow apply it to your model.
My previous comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5362823
Though I agree that the tagline's a little confusing, the first two bullet points ("Never ask for a friend's Wi-Fi password again" and "Sync passwords between your tablet and phone") gave me a clearer understanding of what they're doing here.
Irrespective of the quality of their explanation, your cynical assumption (read: projection) that in comparing themselves to Dropbox they're just trying to "seem disruptive" or to put on airs is disheartening. I don't know these guys, but why not give them the benefit of the doubt? Couldn't they be comparing themselves to Dropbox for another reason – namely, that Dropbox is great at syncing, and that, just perhaps, their app is great at syncing too?
"Dropbox for Wi-Fi" just confuses me, because Dropbox already uses Wi-Fi.
The idea though, instant classic, love it.
I just hope these things are features:
- I can easily see when a friend is trying to connect to my network and can grant access.
- I have to re-grant access after a password change. (no other way around the revoking access issue I can see)
Edit: Yes I have read their FAQ/Security section, I think it is incredibly stupid of them to act this way. I can see apps being built to show the password easily, I don't see why they think it will always require root (and that root is uncommon / hard to do), or why they think anyone gives a fuck about their ToS, or the "law" maybe its illegal for them to access data on their own phone in their country - others it is not.
The biggest concern I have on this issue that they are making people feel safer than they really are, people re-use passwords everywhere, friends are more than likely going to be the ones to check to see if your wifi password matches your facebook (and I'm more worried about that than some random war driver.)
Also, the homepage summed it up for me nicely.
Samuel - if you are reading this, look what you have done!
"Couple your Wi-Fi passwords to your FB account and easily share them with friends" would have been a clearer description for me.
I really like the idea, though. I sincerely hope it will catch on.
Edit: "Social Wi-Fi" or "social Wi-Fi sharing" would probably be the best thing to call this instead of "X for Wi-Fi" (if it weren't for the existence of http://www.socialwifi.net/).
EDIT: read the about page, maybe "Share your wifi password securely with your facebook friends" or "Never have to ask for a wifi password from your facebook friends"
Zynga might not like that though.
There are a bunch of stuff we could do to prevent even that.
(Great idea. I also don't like the tagline.)
I will definitely play with it.
Invite your friends and as soon as we release the iOS version we'll let your friends now.
Ouch on the router passwords. Any chance I could get you to send an email to niklas a.t. instabridge dot com with your name and type of router?
This is exactly what I expected to see the app do--ad hoc file sharing between devices on the same network.
You have chosen a poor descriptor.
[1]: http://www.apple.com/osx/whats-new/#sharing
This happens out of the box on Windows 8 (when tied to a Microsoft account) and freaked me out a little when it first happened. Took a work tablet home for some testing and found it connected to my Wi-Fi automatically. Had me hunting for security problems before I realised what had happened.
As for the product, there are a couple of things that aren't clear; do you actually end up connecting directly to your friends' wifi, or are you routed through their phone? IE can I turn my phone's wifi off and they are still able to access my network? It also comes across that my friends' friends will automatically get access to my network.. don't like that. I imagine it's probably configurable, but that's not made clear.
Agree that dropbox for wi-fi is confusing. Why not something like 'easy wi-fi sharing' or the like.
PS - where was this filmed? Geneva?