Comments on an online service

[Arlen Beiler]

Hello everyone,

I have been thinking recently that I would like to build an online service specifically geared toward TW5. It would be different from Danielo's note self in that the data would also be hosted. 

I am thinking that it would be a paid service, either as a subscription or pay as you go. I don't really know which one yet I don't really know how it all work but I am thinking of using the Amazon web services to build it on and that seems to have some pretty good features for pay as you go.

So now for the question. If you were going to subscribe to the service, what are the main features you would be interested in? The sky's the limit, I want to hear your thoughts.

Thanks,

-Arlen

[Lost Admin]

The main features *I* would want...

1) Cost significantly less than $3.50 per month (that's what I'm paying now to host wiki.suntrap.ca, which is still experimental)

2) Client side encryption by default so that if there is a breach at amazon (or wherever  you host), my data is not put at risk.

3) Can still pull down the TiddlyWiki single-file for backup.

On my nice-to-have list:

4) Multiple user support with either per-tiddler locking to prevent over-writes or some good automated conflict resolution algorithms.

5) Offline mode (like Noteself).

6) No special software required (optional "apps" are fine).

[ste...@gmail.com]

Lost Admin's suggestions are good. In addition to this, I'd love to see:

• Convenient backup and restore
• Option to create multiple TiddlyWikis within the same account, with different properties (encrypted versus publicly readable etc.)
• Creation of new TiddlyWikis with "one click" (or a similarly easy process)
• Clear and transparent information about hosting (location etc.) and data privacy (important for business usage)
  

Another nice-to-have:

• Option to define empty TiddlyWikis as "templates" for the creation of new TiddlyWikis

Cheers,

Stef

[Mat]

• Something like the shut down TiddlySpace model (...or maybe that's the same as the TiddlyWeb model?) with tiddlers as first class citizens spanning across wikis so you can concoct TWs out of tiddlers in other TWs. That was extremely cool and useful. 
  
• But a big limitation with TiddlySpace was that it was limited to that server so when it eventually shut down the connectedness between (exported) wikis broke.  
  
• ...so, for your service, other than export functionality to create a single-file tw...
  
• ...I'd also wish for some solution to export with intact inter-tiddlwikiness.
  
• And the exporting solution must be without lock-in aspects, were your service to shut down. No ransoms, and none of my darlings lost in cyberspace.
  
• Private by default. Click to publish.. some parts of it!
  
• Tiddler encryption.
  
• myprettyurl.com ...no? ok, then  myprettyurl.yourprettydomain.com ...but I also somehow want subspaces... myprettyurl/music , mytw/coding,etc that are "to the left in the url string". (yeah, I did say "somehow").
  
• VERY easy to make new TWs, even simpler than on TiddlySpot. Should be doable: Click a button New TW and it gets a default url. Overwrite the TW title and the url is replaced. It would be very valuable for everyone in the community to zap up problem demos, minimal test cases etc.
  
• Related; easy import (copy) of external TW without need for middle-step downloads to local computer. Give url, checkbox if "import here" or "import to new url", click import ---> Bam!  
  
• Unlimited amount of TWs and tiddlers.
• Separate non-wiki files... hm... I'd be OK with a file-size restriction for non-wiki files.
  
• Absolutely no "enter your phone number", "credit card required", "personal details". Instead pay e.g via paypal or amazon account to get an ID but then identify via a nick and password.
  
• Publish to gallery / plugin store / ... maybe even a commercial market place. You get a cut of each sale or perhaps special accounts have selling rights.
  

...sky's the limit? Ok, throw in a better discussion forum than this place. Based on some wiki type software that centers around small chunks of text, if that exists ;-)

Pricing? TW is my cocaine so I guess I'm not the best at telling what is reasonable, but I'd be prepared to pay a decent sum if I believed in the service. But I'd want a one time sum, or perhaps once per 2 years. No annoying "renew or lose it" subscriptions. What does "pay as you go" mean? If it means a new payment for everything I do then it would definitely have to be well hidden and not remind me of it all the time. I hate seeing the taxi meter tick-tick-tick. But again, I want to feel 100% free to throw together a quick demo or to illustrate some problem, as is the case on TiddlySpot, but if it costed me money to help others then I wouldn't do it...

Really looking forward to this. Need a week? Two?

<:-)

[Arlen Beiler]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions so far. Keep them coming, this gives me ideas. 

I don't know what kind of timeframe I'm looking at. It depends on my schedule and everything.

What I mean by pay as you go is that you pay for exactly what you use, so if all you have is one thing - a little wiki to host one plug-in for other people to download, - you would get charged storage plus all of the traffic for your one little Wiki.

If your Wiki is private, then obviously all the traffic would be just you. 

Amazon web services has a pretty good model for this. Their prices are very reasonable, and it appears that they have the tools for me to do it with.

I would probably lazy load everything besides the system tiddlers. Having an offline cache like note self does would definitely help cut down on bandwidth as well.

Just thought I would address those now to clarify what I'm thinking. 

These are all good suggestions, keep posting.

- Arlen

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[RichardWilliamSmith]

Hi Arlen,

How do you imagine a service like this would be better than existing storage/hosting solutions? What problem are you trying to solve? (is it about backup, synchronisation, collaboration, hosting or a bit of each?).

Personally, I'm never going to use a service where "you would get charged storage plus all of the traffic" unless I'm contracting directly with an actual service provider. At the very least, I would say, you'd need to break pricing into bands with different levels of service. People have become accustomed to the basic tier of such services being free (as unrealistic as this may be).

Regards,

Richard

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[@TiddlyTweeter]

Ciao Arlen

1 - Would payment be through Amazon? IF SO, that is very good. Its proven resilient & pretty clear.

2 - Part of the problem you might face is that the current TYPE of user (i.e. a lot of us in this group) are cheapskates--I can't see you making money from people like us :-)

3 - IMO to make living from it you will have to face the hassle of PROMOTING to new markets. In a way that is GOOD, because it flags the issue that TiddlyWiki is NOT known enough and this might be a way to get it more widely used. It also means, until Danielo gets up and running, its an unusual niche market with virtually no competition.

4 - Following on from 3. How many users would you need to break even? I think getting clear about that might help you a lot asses the viability.

5 - One thing I think Danielo really got right is he's interested not just in advancing an on-line service but also a specific APPLICATION, pitched against Evernote. You might want to examine which existing market segments you are pitching to.

Best wishes
Josiah

[Jan]

Hi Arlen,
If the sky is the limit:
It would be great to have a service which would make it possible to transform TWs into mobile apps and deploy them in the appstores.
Talking monetarisation I could imagine free apps which are paid in advance and some way to share the gain on apps which are sold.

Yours Jan

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[@TiddlyTweeter]

Ciao Jan

Can you clarify what you mean here ... :-)

Best wishes
Josiah

Jan wrote:

... Talking monetarisation I could imagine free apps which are paid in advance ...

[Jan]

I meant the applicant pays a fixed sum in advanced to make his TW-App downloadable in the Appstores for free.

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[ste...@gmail.com]

Hi,

On Wednesday, August 9, 2017 at 4:57:36 AM UTC+2, RichardWilliamSmith wrote:

Personally, I'm never going to use a service where "you would get charged storage plus all of the traffic" unless I'm contracting directly with an actual service provider. At the very least, I would say, you'd need to break pricing into bands with different levels of service. People have become accustomed to the basic tier of such services being free (as unrealistic as this may be).

I believe many people might be more comfortable with a subscription-based service (rather than "pay per use"), see e. g. the pricing of Pinboard (https://pinboard.in/signup/). Note the absence of a "free" option.

Cheers,

Stef

[Sergey Shishkin]

https://web.hypothes.is

 

http://wiki.c2.com/?WelcomeVisitors

[Abraham Samma]

I find this the most compelling reason for an online service; to be able to manage many such wikis (an edition manager so to speak) would be pretty empowering. You could create different downloadable editions that are automatically hosted, backed up and made public whenever needed (e.g a blogging edition).

On Tuesday, August 8, 2017 at 4:11:02 PM UTC+3, ste...@gmail.com wrote:

• Option to create multiple TiddlyWikis within the same account, with different properties (encrypted versus publicly readable etc.)
• Creation of new TiddlyWikis with "one click" (or a similarly easy process

[@TiddlyTweeter]

Ciao Abraham & Arlen

I want to underline this that Abraham wrote as probably the most important aspect from the point of view of having a decent USP (unique selling proposition)--as far as I can see at the moment.

Abraham Samma wrote:

... create different downloadable editions that are automatically hosted, backed up and made public whenever needed ...

A likely central potential market is people who want to host online but don't want to pay for a full-scale hosting service. They want click-n-do. That makes commercial sense since full-hosting costs and if your PRICES are below that its a good incentive.

HOWEVER, there is an issue around what TW Edition(s) you might offer. IF you are wanting to deliver off-the-shelf solutions I think you may want to offer different types of TW: For Scholars, For Writers, For Bloggers, For Galleries, For Gamers etc.

IF its ONLY a system to host but without attention to content type usage needs I think it will be harder to get sales uplift. Sales come in packages that do better if they pay attention to users END objectives. That is what forms the "market" at commercial scale.

All this is a long way of saying: I think, to be economically viable, it would need more than just good, reliable hosting.

Just my guess

Best wishes
Josiah

[Abraham Samma]

I totally agree with you on that. Figuring out end objectives of users is key. You could say we are victims of TW5's success as a diy application.

But there are still a lot of application capabilities that remain unexploited by end users because they find it hard to implement them for themselves (not all of us can make plugins). This is where online services can be of great help if they can successfully supply just in time solutions for our needs. However, one should keep in mind that not all needs may be profitable as you pointed out with respect to hosting.

[Abraham Samma]

Bottom line: running lean experiments is key to discovering what is needed AND workable as a business and what is not.