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Show HN: Pesto, a Digital Workplace
- figassis 5y agoThis looks interesting, but show me the pricing and stop with the signup, it’s free bs. If it’s now, it won’t be later. Google showed us that.
- dsaffy 5y agoWe plan on introducing a paid tier soon. Think Slack / Zoom pricing, free tier + paid tier model. We haven't totally figured it out yet.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Jpoliachik 5y agoThey gave a good explanation as the first FAQ
- groby_b 5y agoI can't imagine many companies that would rely on that - an unknowable future cost in the budget, with only a month migration warning if you can't afford it is not a reasonable proposition. I mean, yes, pre Ramen profitability, saving every cent matters. But there are already calendars, chats, VC apps in the free space that are more likely to stay around than a startup without income. I wish Pesto success, but I think they'd be better off setting a price soon.
- Jpoliachik 5y agoYeah I imagine they're still building and experimenting - and early adopters should treat it as such. Better to set no price rather than guess incorrectly and advertise the wrong price.
- sidhuko 5y agoLooks like an enterprise version of discord.
- james_in_the_uk 5y agoThe concept sounds on point. I do understand some of the reaction in this thread. The cutesy graphics are a bit much for me personally and may not differentiate you sufficiently from other insufficiently professional tools e.g. Discord. I am speaking as someone who has tried to bring Discord into a community organisation (non-profit) and faced resistance based on branding rather than functionality.
- ipnon 5y agoThis sort of thing would have been a research project a few years ago. It's exciting to see the Web evolve. Broadcasting realtime text and video are now building blocks we can rearrange in innovative ways.
- james_in_the_uk 5y agoWebRTC is great for this - and has been available in building block SDK form for some time (eg Tokbox). When I last looked it had codec issues cf the client side tools eg Zoom. Not sure if these have been solved yet?
- marstall 5y agoI love the LoFi Room. Would be cool to be able to set any kind of music there!
- throwaway22032 5y agoIs this what people actually want? To "work" with colleagues through a screen using a cartoon avatar so that you can sit in your boxers and not have to go outside? Man, the world sure has gotten weird. It's like, I thought everyone was sort of like me. Turns out most people are a completely different species. I don't get this from top to bottom. I feel like an 80-year-old looking at the kids in complete and utter bemusement.
- maccard 5y ago> To "work" with colleagues through a screen using a cartoon avatar so that you can sit in your boxers and not have to go outside? There's a huge difference between working remotely with colleagues and "sitting in your boxers not having to go outside". Some of us work with people who don't live in the same city as us, and tools like this make an effort to build up some of the genuine benefits of office work (and in my experience having used a similar tool for a year or so, they do so effectively) The style may not be to your taste and that's fine, but sometimes you need to look past the presentation to understand something.
- throwaway22032 5y agoOne of the most enjoyable parts of having a career is travelling to different places, so this sounds like a net negative to me over just going to the other office. I'm at peace with the fact that I won't ever understand it, it's been two years and I'm not even in the industry any more. I'm still entitled to express that.
- kareemm 5y agoLooks interesting. Would be good to see: 1. How exactly it works 2. How it's different from existing remote work tooling (Slack / Zoom / Google docs / Miro / etc)
- dsaffy 5y agoThe core concept is "rooms" - like Discord voice channels, only way more flexible and built for remote workers. They can be traditional video conferencing, lofi spaces for hanging out, or 2d spaces with spatial audio. The goal is to give teams a flexible workplace consisting of a series of rooms purpose-built for their workflows.
- technotarek 5y agoVisual learner here… Demo video please!
- gadders 5y agoOr screenshots at least.
- vincentmarle 5y agoLooking at the GIF demo, am I correct to understand that you can view Katherine's screen by clicking a button, even if she's not voluntarily sharing? That seems to be a violation of privacy…
- dsaffy 5y agoHey Vincent - the GIF is supposed to show Katherine joining a room and sharing her own screen. You cannot force Katherine to share her screen.
- bosie 5y agoThat GIF is not clear to me either. I don't even get what the concept of a room is supposed to be? Or to to phrase it differently: how is this different than slack?
- dsaffy 5y agoWe are focused on rooms, which are audio-first spaces, not text conversations like Slack. Rooms are flexible containers that can be as simple as a traditional video conference, or more sophisticated, eg walk around on a map or listen to lofi music.
- TIPSIO 5y agoI think about this new industry a lot. Whoever solves the problem of socializing in digital work place is going to make out like a bandit and change the world and open up new biz analytics/metrics, gamified pay structures, and more. It is definitely coming and will be the new normal. Especially as the generation of Fortnite concerts, Halo forge custom discord game meetups, and whatever other freemium games people play get jobs. Meta knows this as everyone laughs at the billionaire and his virtual world dream. What you all have here looks a bit boring through that lens. I’d want to test this to see for sure, but why not make this a total blast to use? The GIF looks just like Slack and another miserable work thing. You’re not competing with Slack. You’re competing with Xbox+Microsoft Office. I’d shift gears and make the highest priority goal just making literally everything ‘fun’. When Katherine joins that room it should feel exciting and rewarding and not just another page tab refresh like GIF. Congrats and great job! Looking forward to seeing your success.
- sergiomattei 5y agoHow is this any different from existing solutions?
- addajones 5y agoMore animations and drawings to make it look cool and exciting and hip. lol.
- 0des 5y agoNone of this stuff speaks to me, just looking at your website. Yeah its cute and it's on-par with trends but just give it to me straight in the first sentence- im busy, and already in my workplace so lets start there. If it's chat with a bupbupbup attached, then tell me its a chat with a bupbupbup attached, if you're trying to do 'its a discord, but for programmers and startuppy types' then say that directly. Shoot me straight next time, today you lost me.
- ghostly_s 5y agoWhat the heck is a "bupbupbup?"
- 0des 5y agolmao this guy doesn't know a bupbupbup
- terminatornet 5y agoi think that's the mcdonald's theme, ya know "bupbupbup i'm lovin it"
- justusthane 5y agoParent just means "chat plus X", I think. Chat plus video. Chat plus rooms. Chat plus bupbupbup.
- 0des 5y agoThis is the meaning that was intended, thanks.
- dsaffy 5y agoThere are parallels to Discord; the HN audience knows Discord well and so if we were only trying to appeal to this audience we would probably market it that way. A large chunk (possibly the majority) of our existing users don't know about Discord though and it doesn't make sense to purely market it in relation to that. There are also some noticeable differences, particularly: - integrations are focused on work products, eg calendar, rather than what games you are playing etc - rooms (similar to Discord voice channel) can be shared on a calendar for guests - we prioritize different things in screenshare (quality over FPS, since it's for work not gaming)
- vorpalhex 5y agoToo mockup heavy with no actual screenshots. No pricing. I have no interest in my coworkers knowing I am listening to inappropriate music. I definitely don't want them freely glancing at my screen without permission. Animated avatars don't seem to be taking off in the workplace. Hell even outside the workplace my friend group usually wants to see real faces.
- dsaffy 5y agoYou can't look at screen share without permission - this is clearly something we screwed up in the landing animation. It's supposed to show Katherine sharing her own screen. Pricing is coming soon and will free tier + paid tier (think like Slack / Zoom pricing).
- p2hari 5y agoWe had used something similar teemyco [1]. But as most of you mentioned here, I think privacy is a big thing. Also as an introvert, I do not like such solutions which might mandate to have constant online presence. 1. https://www.teemyco.com/ https://www.teemyco.com/
- getcrunk 5y agoHow did they make that animated screenshot gif thing. Is their some cool tool I can use to do that? I don't want to program css animations for it.
- SjorsVG 5y agoI think it looks nice.
- markstos 5y agoJust because you come to work dressed as an avatar doesn't make it professional attire to wear a dog on your head.
- abletonlive 5y agoOut of all the critiques I've seen about Pesto, I think this one is probably the worst I've seen. So should slack only limit us to having professional avatars too? Looking at my 2000+ employee organization, it's all pretty much split between "professional" and "unprofessional" avatars. And what if your startup is something like Chewy? Then coming to work with a dog hat is probably pretty professional actually.
- mmanfrin 5y agoI'm reasonably certain the comment you are replying to is a joke.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- browningstreet 5y agoWhy's everything moving and jiggling? No thanks.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- rootsudo 5y agoI like the cutsey style. Surprised to see Japanese and a Producthunt Leaderboard.
- dsaffy 5y agoWe have a lot of Japanese users (organically, over 25% of our users) so we internationalized. ProductHunt leaderboard was a weekend project for me... I won't lie, there's not much connection, just some fun.
- d0100 5y agoWe've been using Pesto since it was pragli Works well but there is no message history search, it is worth using since it's free
- dsaffy 5y agoHey there - there is a search button that allows you to search messages. Is that not working for you? Reach out to us via the Pesto team chat in the app for support on this.
- sno6 5y agoAs someone who works for a remote company, I'm excited by the idea of more casual communication tools. Creating a zoom room and sending an invite just feels so.. formal. With that said, I'd love it if there was a quick, real life demo on the site to show how this tool actually works, i'd guess that it would help more with conversion than an animated GIF. All the best.
- dsaffy 5y agoThanks for the feedback.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- brailsafe 5y agoI've seen a few digital workspace/virtual or spatial room/workspace apps out there, but I couldn't imagine a less pleasant way to work. It seems to me—though I'd be curious if anyone who's not a manager feels differently—that it takes all the worst aspects of being at a physical workplace, and ruins all the best aspects of remote work
- thirdlamp 5y agoI like the gather.town concept more just judging by their websites. Does anyone have experience with both and can share how they compare?
- emptysongglass 5y agoI'd also appreciate a rundown between these two or others in the same vein. I'm shopping around for a solution that's more digitally "present" than Teams for our company.
- enduser 5y agoI signed up for this to check it out. It's a really amazing feat of technical execution. Congratulations for pulling it off! I hope you gain traction and evolve this into something lasting and impactful.
- pedalpete 5y agoI wasn't willing to take that step on a product that I need to use with somebody else. It would be really helpful to have a video demo of the product to know what I'm missing. The visual cartoony images made me think it might just be vapourware.
- dsaffy 5y agoThe "where's the demo video" has been consistent feedback on this thread and we'll probably put something together.
- dsaffy 5y agoThank you :)
- steve_adams_86 5y agoThis is meant to be constructive feedback: This almost looks like it's supposed to be a game for kids. I'm not seeing how it'll help me. I know it's intended to allow me to work with my remote team easier, but I don't see how exactly. I picked up something about rooms and possibly screen sharing (It gave me vibes of someone seeing my screen on demand though - I hope not?) This "Present your authentic self" bit, showing a cartoon emoji; what is the appeal? Am I supposed to make a cartoon of myself? Do I have to? Sorry if I could answer these myself if I read more. I suppose my feedback is that I don't want to read more because what I've seen isn't compelling enough. Having said that, I'm glad to see work is being done in this space. Good luck pressing forward – there's a ton of progress to be made and real productivity gains to uncover.
- emptysongglass 5y agoAs a counterpoint to the extremely negative commentary I'm reading in this thread, I like "the present your authentic self without turning on your camera" bit. Sometimes I don't want to wear a shirt (or pants!) at home or don't want to be surprised absently rubbing my jaw in thought or making a weird face. I love to see innovation in the space of remote work tools and I can confidently say Slack and friends ain't it. I want a experience of serendipity-making leveraging some of the same mechanisms physical office goers make use of.
- dsaffy 5y agoAppreciate it!
- steve_adams_86 5y agoApologies if I came off too negatively. I meant to be frank about my reaction in hopes that it might inform the people behind it how others perceive it. I should add that I can tell the people behind it are good at their craft and the guiding principles seem like good ones. It’s mostly the marketing that has thrown me off. I also recognize that I might just be too old and crusty to get it. I used to be with “it” and then they changed what “it” is.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
- ketzo 5y agoI had some friends participate in a virtual hackathon run pretty much entirely over Discord. The final demos took place in a very "room-focused" fashion - each team/product had their own Discord channel, and people could pop in and out over the course of the 90 minute demo time. It was very successful at replicating the feel of booths in an expo hall, and opened my eyes to how much I enjoyed the "audio rooms" concept. Right away, looking at the landing page, I love the idea of having my own little virtual "office" that people could pop in and out of. That's probably the thing I miss most about in-person work: informal, extemporaneous communication (that doesn't take place over text). I get the feeling that the right audience would absolutely love this product. Good luck, folks!
- dsaffy 5y agoThanks!
- mdrzn 5y agoThis looks really good. I don't have a use for it since I don't work remote, but it could be a cool alternative to Discord for small groups.