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Share your ideas

35 points by evancaine ↗ HN
I've just been through my ideas file and realised there are several that have been in there for a while. I doubt I'll implement them but I'd be interested in others' opinions. Here are a few in no particular order.

anyone else care to share?

ev

62 comments

[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 134 ms ] thread
evancaine
- a "proof of posting" service for email. You send emails via the service which keeps hold of a copy for x years, accessible by the sender or recipient. Useful for mailing assignments and other important documents
sengan
Add to that a proof of receipt mechanism using a webbug.

(Edit: a webbug is a small image with a unique identifier that is downloaded by the client when the document is shown, assuming that image loading is enabled)

cousin_it
You mean, CC a trusted third party?
[dead] axxin
You should send this idea to USPS. ;)
evancaine
- an online log/journal for numeric information. You IM, tweet or email the info to the service where it gets logged for later review and analysis. Useful for keeping track of calories, exercise, mileage e.t.c
evancaine
- an online noticeboard. When I was at uni, notices relevant to my group of students were either emailed out to everyone or uploaded as a word document to a shared drive. The former flooded my inbox with irrelevant notices, the latter was a pain to have to keep checking. Instead, I can imagine an online noticeboard with tags/directories and expiration dates set by the authors. Users would get a ping when a new notice went up for the tags/directories they had subscribed to.
unalone
My university uses a Facebook Page for this.
kwamenum86
You COULD use the Twitter hammer for this nail
mattmanser
How do you do the ping without an email?
evancaine
- chat rooms based on TV channels. Users can chat live via IM/sms/tweet about the show currently being viewed.
pwmanagerdied
Though I don't watch TV so this isn't directly applicable to me, after seeing it written out I'm amazed that this isn't already common. It's a really good, sensible idea.
petercooper
It sorta happens with certain shows already, just on Twitter.

For example, in the UK there's a business show called Dragons' Den where people pitch for money for their crazy business ideas. Quite a large number of people tweet about the show while it's on and almost everything that happens. Not quite "chat" though.

jacquesm
hehe, funny! I thought of that exact same thing years ago, I even registered 'ontvnow.com' for it...
mikehorn
Yup. I thought about this about a year back as well. Some networks have experimented with micro-sites and social media plugins with this type of functionality, but I'm not aware of anything that has really caught on yet.
doosra
The big problem I see in the implementation of this idea: How does one forum handle the mass of users? I'm not talking about technical issues, more of the user experience. How can all users engage in the discussion without being overwhelmed?
cjg
Each user could pick how many other users they want in the forum. They would get a random sample of all the users. Not happy with the selection? Kick that person out of your forum and get another one from the pool automatically.
evancaine
- a site making it easy for people to share their photo essays. There are plenty of photo sharing sites and plenty of photo essay sites from the big boys but I've yet to find a site that makes it easy for people to share their photo essays.
snitko
Okay, there's been enough threads about sharing ideas on HN, but let me post the one I thought about tonight.

I was thinking about eBook readers. About how convenient they could be for reading not only books, but blogs, rss feeds, mail. How nice would it be if they could also work as gps navigators, if they could play some video and post to twitter. Now I know some of these devices already have these features, but how about having a platform (like iPhone) and an application store for it? Wouldn't it be great to open these devices for developers? Because, to think about it, I spend about 1-1,5 reading rss headers and blogs a day and it's really not that fun to sit in front of my desktop or notebook for that. I'd like something more mobile, but not as small as a cellphone. And, I assume, this could be one of the trends of the industry: we don't need to have these large shiny screens anymore for something as trivial as reading.

chaosprophet
Might you be looking for the Crunchpad [http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/06/03/crunchpad-the-launch-pr...]???
snitko
Close. But I bet the price for that is higher and it uses more energy. I would like the device to have a screen exactly like ebook readers.

They also say CrunchPad uses browser as a platform, which makes it a bit inconvenient to read pdf-s and do some other things. Not talking about writing device-specific applications.

petercooper
- Twitter digest. A Web tool that makes it easy for me to select a bunch of tweets (such as those in response to a question I raised, or just some I find on a search) and then have them repackaged into images or nice HTML I can put on my blog. Sorta like http://twictur.es but on speed.

- Better niche content aggregator. Like a "Planet" site but not pulling everything from the sources.. I don't wanna see non-Ruby related stuff on PlanetRubyonRails, for example.

- A site that lets you put in a URL and then a day/hour/whatever later e-mails you a link to a ZIP archive of that site for you to download for safe keeping. (I think I saw something like this a few days ago, but it's been on my list a while.)

- A blog like LifeHacker but just for coders/developers.

- A blog called something like "Lifeform A Day" that has a basic post about a different type of life/animal each day.

- A Web app dedicated to helping you make headlines or titles for blog posts, pages, etc. Has a giant swipe file of headlines from throughout the ages and will switch in and out terms of your selection automatically and let you scroll through until you find something that works for you.

snitko
The last one: isn't that google?
petercooper
You can find swipe files with Google, though there's nothing really dedicated to the task, and it'd be useful to have it switch nouns and verbs for you to get a better immediate view when scanning ;-)
vijayr
something to reduce the waiting time while making customer service calls. may be an iphone app. I specify the service (PSEG), time I would be available (4 pm to 9pm), expiry date (3 days). It would call the damn service on my behalf, and connect me once a human is on the other side, without disrupting any of the other phone tasks. no clue how it is technically possible, or if something like this already exists.
chaosprophet
Since the iphone is not advanced enough to support background processes, the only way it would be possible would be through a server side process. Interesting idea, and definitely worth a try I guess.
lukifer
> Since the iphone is not advanced enough to support background processes

To be pedantic, the OS fully supports this. Apple simply doesn't allow third-party processes to do so (yet). Might be doable using push notifications, though.

sixspeed
I love this thread.

While considering what I could add - all I could think of was an old Neighborhood comic that pictured a guy in a suit and tie slumped against a building holding a tin cup in his hand. Around his neck is a sign that reads "My mind is a hodge-podge of half-baked ideas."

My biorhythm must be off today. Yeah, that must be it.

gradschool
Single sender email addresses -- The idea is that a subscriber to the service gives out a separate email address to each friend or associate that he's willing to hear from (maybe from serialized business cards or whatever). The mail server accepts and records the first sender to any previously unused address, and subsequently performs a policy dependent action (e.g., blocking) when mail to that address is received from any other sender. Return addresses on outoging mail also have to be handled consistently. Not sure if there's a market but I know I'd use it myself.

Any non-obvious flaws?

lionheart
What if the friend you gave the card to has several email addresses? Or changes his address and tries to email you from the new one?
gradschool
Bayesean filtering? If it's trained on a corpus of mail from the same person, it could be more effective than in the general case.
jorgem
Until they forward you a mail.
kwamenum86
That isn't bad. The only obvious flaws are running out of unique addresses or, if addresses are easily guessable, having spammers iterate over your free addresses inserting themselves as the "first sender."

A system where that person is added as the sender to the system BEFORE they send an email for the first time would solve this, however, this is equivalent to white-listing in current email solutions.

frig
I do something like this manually in my personal life.

It works good for memberships or online shopping; you have something like amazon.orders@your.domain, zappos.orders@your.domain, etc.

In real life not so much: people know they're getting a "fake" email address (regardless of whatever scheme you pick) and get put off by this.

GavinB
A discussion site with a page for every wikipedia article. The discussion would be focused on general consideration of the subject, not the content of the article. You could discuss anything from your favorite band to Bernoulli's principle.
GavinB
A version of social discussion site optimized for continuous discussion around a topic. One of my biggest complaints about HN is that it is very reactionary and every discussion ends in 24-48 hours. One of the reasons we have less "Hacker News" is that we've exhausted superficial discussions of a lot of topics and don't have a way to go more in-depth.

I have some ideas about how to implement this but I don't want to spam the comments with a long essay.

jimmybot
I totally agree; it's a problem I've thought about as well, and it's not just HN either. People scan news headlines (whether on news media outlets or on news aggregators) always looking for something shocking or moving or hilarious or despicable. But after the initial reaction, often it fizzes out and there's no follow up. I would say though comments fairly quickly, the discussion can and does continue at times through a second or third link posted that gets voted up. But yeah, not enough times, and it's not even obvious often what it was posted in response to.

Well, I'd be interested in looking at that long essay if you end up posting it somewhere.

philwelch
Along the same lines--a wiki that contains all documented arguments and counterarguments on a given topic instead of rehashing them all the time over and over again on social discussion sites.
derefr
I've thought about this one too. I think I can write less than an essay, though: the solution is basically tagging in reverse. Comment threads aren't attached to individual links, but rather to tags (thus there is a 1:1 correspondence between "tag" and "discussion"; the words can be used interchangeably.) Discussions keep a list at the top of all the articles that go into them. The score of a link isn't an independent variable, but rather the sum of the "relevance" scores for each link-tag pair (that is, the weights of the graph edges.)
joshu
so, an IRC channel?
derefr
Not quite—it's about half-way in between a Reddit-like model and an IRC server. Unlike an IRC server, everything someone "says" (links to) must be cross-posted to all the threads/channels they think it's applicable to, instead of hidden within the context of the conversation being had at the moment. Unlike an IRC server, people can vote on the articles' relevances to each conversation. And unlike an IRC server, the articles with the highest aggregate relevances show up on a "front page." It would take about the same amount of work to make an IRC service daemon that managed voting and gave a "front page" listing as it would to extend a social-news/bookmarking service with tag-link-pair voting and move discussions to tags. Plus, I think the IRC culture would be less willing to accept the resulting "conversation bleed" than the social-news/bookmarking culture.
GavinB
A microfinance or charity site (ala Kiva.com) that lets you skype with the recipient of the charity at the moment of giving.

Translation and synchronicity would be major obstacles to this.

bufordtwain
A portable camera/audio system transmits what the wearer is seeing and hearing to an online audience in real-time. The wearer would be a "remote virtual tourist" and would respond to directions from the online viewers and would walk around allowing the online viewers to travel to places virtually.
bufordtwain
A realistic yet inexpensive robot hand that can curl its fingers in response to a remote wearer (wearing a glove). Would enable physical handshakes over the internet. And probably other things as well, people being as creative as they are...
Timothee
That would be perfect for when somebody contacts you by email about millions of dollars to share. Once there's a real physical handshake, they would have no way to back out of that deal! Too much honor at stake!
callmeed
1. An URL shortening service for online stores. Online stores embed some JS into their store templates. Every page that displays a product now has an option to "share this product" (sort of like the UserVoice/GetSatisfaction "Feedback" tab). Clicking the tab/button gives the visitor a short URL for the product and options to share on Twitter/Facebook. Charge based on number of products. I actually think this could work (1 big customer and you're ramen profitable). If anyone is interested in teaming up on it, let me know.

2. A small .5-2TB hard drive or SSD array with a small cable. At the end of the cable is a memory-card shaped connector. The drive attaches to your digital camera's via the tripod screw. The cable goes into your memory card slot. Device acts like a high-capacity memory card. Perhaps even works as a RAID to prevent corruption.

trafficlight
Number 2 would be awesome.

I've been wishing there was a CompactFlash to hard drive adapter for a while now.

gruseom
Someday I want to make websites to run experiments on subliminal perception.
jorgem
Better health care.
alexmacgregor
I think there's some good new communication tools around at the moment but it's an area I think that's difficult to monetize. (Facebook and Twitter IMO will have to look at something in addition to advertising.)

I would say there's plenty of opportunities for online marketplaces.

Internet growth in Asia right now, and potentially Africa in the future, will open up tonnes and the need to exchange goods and services.

Developing economies will want the same consumer goods as we do, and offcourse the enterprise will need the tools in order to provide these.

hanskuder
A small device embedded in a car's dashboard that monitors events such as: - Anti-lock brakes or traction control kicking in (slippery road conditions) - Drastic changes in temperature/humidity (potential for ice, fog, or whatever) - Current speed (traffic flow)

and uploads this data, along with GPS coordinates, to a central server via cell phone data link or WiMax or something. Aggregate data about traffic speed and weather conditions nearby could be sent out to subscribers for display on an in-dash device:

"Hey, I see that 1.3 miles ahead on Hwy 494 three cars reported traction control kicking in within the last 20 minutes. Be careful!"

Getting manufacturers' cooperation for hooking into the cars' computers would be really tough. But the technology is perfectly feasible.

trafficlight
This is a cool idea.

Along the same car lines: I'd like a small computer in my car that would record all of it's vital information. Fuel trims, coolant temperature, air flow, plus things like speed and rpms. The computer would track trends to let you know of any problems that may come up or to make sure you are getting the best performance. The computer would also sync up wirelessly, either Wifi or a 3G network.

It might also be interesting to have a website that compared your stats to others of the same make/model.

I'm not sure the technical requirements for such a thing, but obviously the car companies would have to be in on it.

lukifer
A tablet-like touchscreen computer designed specifically for use in the kitchen, designed to mount on a fridge or cabinet. Inventories fridge and pantry, possibly with the aid of a barcode reader or camera to read UPCs. Connects via Wi-Fi to a recipe database, and attempts to find recipes based on fridge inventory, with full health statistics for each meal. (Oh, and a media player wouldn't hurt either.)

If the UI/UX was polished right, I think it could go very mainstream.

anibal
A python console in the web. maybe this exist