6 ms·

How we shifted 6Wunderkinder to Wunderlist, again

34 points by CReber 14y ago

webjunkie 14y ago
"more than 20 engineers" on a to-do list app? Isn't that quite an overhead? I mean 37signals have 9 developers and they successfully run several products (even with their easy-going lifestyle).
- erroca 14y ago
  Remember, they are building a backend and clients for pretty much every platform available, I would say 20 engineers is barely enough to accomplish such a task in a timely manner. 37signal makes their apps available on web only.
  - sync 14y ago
    Their clients are really just thin wrappers around their website, e.g. UIWebView for iOS. Not sure how that takes three iOS developers.
    - bibinou 14y ago
      They're rebuilding everything native : > So we decided to rebuild Wunderlist for all major platforms (Web, iOS, Android Mac & Windows).
    - ilja 14y ago
      Have you read the article? They're moving away from titanium to native apps: > So we decided to rebuild Wunderlist for all major platforms (Web, iOS, Android Mac & Windows) The android client hasn't been a wrapper for a long time, and the new iOS version we don't know, since it's not yet released.
    - rafifyalda 14y ago
      Wunderkit was entirely native. There were 0 iOS developers involved in working on Wunderlist with Titanium as you simply don't need native developers for Titanium code (the maintainers in the past were Javascript and front-end developers). I joined as the first iOS developer and worked on Wunderkit. Now all the developers work on the native client. There's also a lot of shared library code between the Mac and iOS team
- CReber 14y ago
  We focus on building a solid product with a consistent experience for several platforms - Wunderlist 2 will launch with native clients on Web, iOS, Android, Mac and Windows. To build a high quality product on every platform, I think you need at least 2 developers for each platform. If you are interested this is how we split our team: 3 iOS Developers 3 Android Developers 2 Mac Developers 2 Windows Developers 5 Web Developers (they not only build the web app) 5 Backend Developers 1 Sysadmin
  - stevenwei 14y ago
    Wow, that's a pretty serious burn rate. Isn't Wunderlist/Wunderkit essentially a free todo-list app? How are you planning to monetize into a sustainable business?
    - CReber 14y ago
      Yes, it is a serious burn rate, but we have three million users to maintain. That's why we are now just focused on our successful product. Wunderlist is a freemium product, we'll add premium features probably at the beginning of next year for a monthly subscription fee.
      - cmcewen 14y ago
        Do you expect those users to be sticky? The barrier to entry for making a to-do list is negligible, and having a long history of completed tasks is of very little value.
        CReber 14y ago
        With Wunderlist we've already seen many repeat users and have daily users adding new tasks, especially during the week. With Wunderlist 2 we will have more features that will help grow this. Fred Wilson wrote about user metrics, he called it the 30/10/10 rule (http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/07/301010.html http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/07/301010.html) - 30% monthly active users, 10% daily active users and 10% new users each month. We can apply this rule to Wunderlist, but as we're in the 'task' market, we generally have more monthly users than daily users - because the product is more optimized for weekly use.
shawnc 14y ago
Pretty disappointed as I had my whole family switch to Wunderkit, and all of us get on board using it. However... after a few months most of us stopped - it just wasn't clicking like I hoped it would. I know some of my family members still use it personally with their significant others tho, so they'll be bummed by this news. This sort of thing makes me very wary of choosing to use something to manage things as important as Wunderkit was setup for - especially when they're made 'free'. Right now I use Trello in my work, and even tho they constantly say 'It'll all be OKAY, this will be around a long time' - this makes me weary once more.
- CReber 14y ago
  Wunderkit will remain stable for some time yet. Once Wunderlist 2 is ready we will be offering an export tool, so that your friends and family will be able to transfer their data directly from Wunderkit to Wunderlist 2.
  - shawnc 14y ago
    Thanks for the reply Christian. I'll be sure to let them know if that fact. I respect the nature of the decision, and i know it was certainly not an easy one. You've handled it very well, and the communication around that fact very well.

34 points by CReber 14y ago

"more than 20 engineers" on a to-do list app? Isn't that quite an overhead? I mean 37signals have 9 developers and they successfully run several products (even with their easy-going lifestyle).

erroca 14y ago
Remember, they are building a backend and clients for pretty much every platform available, I would say 20 engineers is barely enough to accomplish such a task in a timely manner. 37signal makes their apps available on web only.
- sync 14y ago
  Their clients are really just thin wrappers around their website, e.g. UIWebView for iOS. Not sure how that takes three iOS developers.
  - bibinou 14y ago
    They're rebuilding everything native : > So we decided to rebuild Wunderlist for all major platforms (Web, iOS, Android Mac & Windows).
  - ilja 14y ago
    Have you read the article? They're moving away from titanium to native apps: > So we decided to rebuild Wunderlist for all major platforms (Web, iOS, Android Mac & Windows) The android client hasn't been a wrapper for a long time, and the new iOS version we don't know, since it's not yet released.
  - rafifyalda 14y ago
    Wunderkit was entirely native. There were 0 iOS developers involved in working on Wunderlist with Titanium as you simply don't need native developers for Titanium code (the maintainers in the past were Javascript and front-end developers). I joined as the first iOS developer and worked on Wunderkit. Now all the developers work on the native client. There's also a lot of shared library code between the Mac and iOS team
CReber 14y ago
We focus on building a solid product with a consistent experience for several platforms - Wunderlist 2 will launch with native clients on Web, iOS, Android, Mac and Windows. To build a high quality product on every platform, I think you need at least 2 developers for each platform. If you are interested this is how we split our team: 3 iOS Developers 3 Android Developers 2 Mac Developers 2 Windows Developers 5 Web Developers (they not only build the web app) 5 Backend Developers 1 Sysadmin
- stevenwei 14y ago
  Wow, that's a pretty serious burn rate. Isn't Wunderlist/Wunderkit essentially a free todo-list app? How are you planning to monetize into a sustainable business?
  - CReber 14y ago
    Yes, it is a serious burn rate, but we have three million users to maintain. That's why we are now just focused on our successful product. Wunderlist is a freemium product, we'll add premium features probably at the beginning of next year for a monthly subscription fee.
    - cmcewen 14y ago
      Do you expect those users to be sticky? The barrier to entry for making a to-do list is negligible, and having a long history of completed tasks is of very little value.
      - CReber 14y ago
        With Wunderlist we've already seen many repeat users and have daily users adding new tasks, especially during the week. With Wunderlist 2 we will have more features that will help grow this. Fred Wilson wrote about user metrics, he called it the 30/10/10 rule (http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/07/301010.html http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/07/301010.html) - 30% monthly active users, 10% daily active users and 10% new users each month. We can apply this rule to Wunderlist, but as we're in the 'task' market, we generally have more monthly users than daily users - because the product is more optimized for weekly use.

shawnc 14y ago

Pretty disappointed as I had my whole family switch to Wunderkit, and all of us get on board using it. However... after a few months most of us stopped - it just wasn't clicking like I hoped it would. I know some of my family members still use it personally with their significant others tho, so they'll be bummed by this news. This sort of thing makes me very wary of choosing to use something to manage things as important as Wunderkit was setup for - especially when they're made 'free'. Right now I use Trello in my work, and even tho they constantly say 'It'll all be OKAY, this will be around a long time' - this makes me weary once more.

CReber 14y ago
Wunderkit will remain stable for some time yet. Once Wunderlist 2 is ready we will be offering an export tool, so that your friends and family will be able to transfer their data directly from Wunderkit to Wunderlist 2.
- shawnc 14y ago
  Thanks for the reply Christian. I'll be sure to let them know if that fact. I respect the nature of the decision, and i know it was certainly not an easy one. You've handled it very well, and the communication around that fact very well.