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Show HN: VidFall – Pay with time, not your wallet

30 points by badgercapital 12y ago

Dragonai 12y ago
I like that the competitive edge doesn't feel very pressuring. Cool idea, I'll keep an eye on this site. Also just a quick note - the copy on the About Us section could use some slight sentence structure and organization checking. :) The end in particular reads a little strangely: > We even feature charity auctions, which apply the revenue users generate from watching video ads towards great causes around the world. Thanks for your interest in VidFall. Founded in September 2013, VidFall is a portfolio company of Wasabi Ventures, LLC.
dkyc 12y ago
The age old problem that the demographic that watches video ads for .50$ is not the demographic you want to advertise to...
- ianamartin 12y ago
  So what? The people who click on google ad words and Facebook ads aren't the target market for those either. Doesn't stop them from making bank.
bengali3 12y ago
Clean and i got the message in 3 seconds. I would guess your viewers will result in lower conversion rates for the advertisers when viewed from your page. Not sure how to handle that if advertisers notice. Also, since your whole pitch is about the $$$ your leaderboard should be tied to $ somehow instead of just # of watches. That's more for your own dashboard. (ie highlight the wins, not the amount of pain other users have been put through)
- badgercapital 12y ago
  Definitely need to work on the pitch a bit. Thanks, this will put the fire under me to get around to cleaning that up. Appreciate the kind words!
nacs 12y ago
First time I loaded the page, I got some massive text in the middle of the page that said: Error 500 CDbConnection failed to open the DB connection. Should look into caching that front page or at least handling DB errors more gracefully.
badgercapital 12y ago
Wow, well thank you HN for the support. Really incredible to be on the front page. You guys blew up AWS! Cleaned up the DB issues! Let's party!
sadkingbilly 12y ago
How does this not violate the terms of your affiliate agreements? Are the video ads from direct clients of yours or through a general affiliate program?
- thedangler 12y ago
  I too, would like to know this.
  - calbear81 12y ago
    Yup, so who's gonna build the automatic video watching / bidding bot?
brandonpindulic 12y ago
This is awesome
obisw4n 12y ago
Its very hard to trust this website when there is a massive misrepresentation of the number of viewers.
- badgercapital 12y ago
  Hey the watchers variable is dependent upon the number of people actually watching videos. We were making a TON of calls to our ad networks at the peak of the HN craze, but not all the videos were coming through. That is why the viewer variable was all screwy. Lots of work ahead, appreciate the constructive criticism!
ChrisArchitect 12y ago
In Time (2011) - "... To avoid overpopulation, time has become the currency and the way people pay for luxuries and necessities...."
llamataboot 12y ago
Bought an Amazon gift card to test it out. Says it will arrive in 24 hours. Would be nice if instant, but looks good so far!
- badgercapital 12y ago
  Hey, we ship each night at 6pm! Your card should arrive then. Thank you so much for giving us a try.
  - josh-wrale 12y ago
    Which time zone?
neil_s 12y ago
Really cool concept! I want to try it out, just for the game theory aspects of it. Has anyone successfully received the items they ordered off of this?
- badgercapital 12y ago
  Thanks! Appreciate the kind words. We ship out around 6pm every night. We have a lot to do today!
  - neil_s 12y ago
    Turns out I couldn't buy because my Bank of America card currently has a UK address attached to it. Let people use international billing addresses for digital goods like Amazon gift cards? (Also, better aesthetics (like removing the stripe texture and the greyscale menu) would make this site way more trust-worthy in my eyes. Currently it looks too much like a rough tech demo quickly thrown together on Wordpress)
- jwyatt1281 12y ago
  I Received my first $10 Amazon E-Card within a few days of the purchase.
aaron987 12y ago
I honestly don't see the benefit of this. If I understand it correctly, a bunch of people watch ads, causing the price to go down. But only one person gets the discounted price, and everyone else who sat there watching ads gets nothing? In other words, the majority of people using the site get no benefit.
- badgercapital 12y ago
  Sorry you feel that way. Thanks for checking us out! Cheers!
nicksergeant 12y ago
Wow, I'm quite impressed. I bought the $100 restaurant gift card (for $30). They sent it to me tonight, but it was only for $50. I emailed them, and they responded within 8 minutes with the remaining $50. Kudos to their customer support.
chatmasta 12y ago
These business models usually face a problem of one ad view not being enough to incentivize someone to watch it. I like the penny auction spin you put on that. Clever. That said, is your ad network aware of this and okay with it? How do you verify these are real viewers? There are a lot of "attack" vectors here... automated servers + proxies, or even just somebody with a clickbot on their home computer cycling through videos and buying an item once its price goes below what they can sell it for elsewhere? Also, why would your users not just buy giftcards at any number of the discount gift sites, many of which offer higher discounts than you, without the need to watch a video? I'm very curious about the economics here, because I find it hard to imagine you could win all these "startup of the month" type accolades without thinking this through.
galuggus 12y ago
Who do you use for your ad network?

30 points by badgercapital 12y ago

I like that the competitive edge doesn't feel very pressuring. Cool idea, I'll keep an eye on this site. Also just a quick note - the copy on the About Us section could use some slight sentence structure and organization checking. :) The end in particular reads a little strangely: > We even feature charity auctions, which apply the revenue users generate from watching video ads towards great causes around the world. Thanks for your interest in VidFall. Founded in September 2013, VidFall is a portfolio company of Wasabi Ventures, LLC.

dkyc 12y ago

The age old problem that the demographic that watches video ads for .50$ is not the demographic you want to advertise to...

ianamartin 12y ago
So what? The people who click on google ad words and Facebook ads aren't the target market for those either. Doesn't stop them from making bank.

bengali3 12y ago

Clean and i got the message in 3 seconds. I would guess your viewers will result in lower conversion rates for the advertisers when viewed from your page. Not sure how to handle that if advertisers notice. Also, since your whole pitch is about the $$$ your leaderboard should be tied to $ somehow instead of just # of watches. That's more for your own dashboard. (ie highlight the wins, not the amount of pain other users have been put through)

badgercapital 12y ago
Definitely need to work on the pitch a bit. Thanks, this will put the fire under me to get around to cleaning that up. Appreciate the kind words!

nacs 12y ago

First time I loaded the page, I got some massive text in the middle of the page that said: Error 500 CDbConnection failed to open the DB connection. Should look into caching that front page or at least handling DB errors more gracefully.

badgercapital 12y ago

Wow, well thank you HN for the support. Really incredible to be on the front page. You guys blew up AWS! Cleaned up the DB issues! Let's party!

sadkingbilly 12y ago

How does this not violate the terms of your affiliate agreements? Are the video ads from direct clients of yours or through a general affiliate program?

thedangler 12y ago
I too, would like to know this.
- calbear81 12y ago
  Yup, so who's gonna build the automatic video watching / bidding bot?

brandonpindulic 12y ago

This is awesome

obisw4n 12y ago

Its very hard to trust this website when there is a massive misrepresentation of the number of viewers.

badgercapital 12y ago
Hey the watchers variable is dependent upon the number of people actually watching videos. We were making a TON of calls to our ad networks at the peak of the HN craze, but not all the videos were coming through. That is why the viewer variable was all screwy. Lots of work ahead, appreciate the constructive criticism!

ChrisArchitect 12y ago

In Time (2011) - "... To avoid overpopulation, time has become the currency and the way people pay for luxuries and necessities...."

llamataboot 12y ago

Bought an Amazon gift card to test it out. Says it will arrive in 24 hours. Would be nice if instant, but looks good so far!

badgercapital 12y ago
Hey, we ship each night at 6pm! Your card should arrive then. Thank you so much for giving us a try.
- josh-wrale 12y ago
  Which time zone?

neil_s 12y ago

Really cool concept! I want to try it out, just for the game theory aspects of it. Has anyone successfully received the items they ordered off of this?

badgercapital 12y ago
Thanks! Appreciate the kind words. We ship out around 6pm every night. We have a lot to do today!
- neil_s 12y ago
  Turns out I couldn't buy because my Bank of America card currently has a UK address attached to it. Let people use international billing addresses for digital goods like Amazon gift cards? (Also, better aesthetics (like removing the stripe texture and the greyscale menu) would make this site way more trust-worthy in my eyes. Currently it looks too much like a rough tech demo quickly thrown together on Wordpress)
jwyatt1281 12y ago
I Received my first $10 Amazon E-Card within a few days of the purchase.

aaron987 12y ago

I honestly don't see the benefit of this. If I understand it correctly, a bunch of people watch ads, causing the price to go down. But only one person gets the discounted price, and everyone else who sat there watching ads gets nothing? In other words, the majority of people using the site get no benefit.

badgercapital 12y ago
Sorry you feel that way. Thanks for checking us out! Cheers!

nicksergeant 12y ago

Wow, I'm quite impressed. I bought the $100 restaurant gift card (for $30). They sent it to me tonight, but it was only for $50. I emailed them, and they responded within 8 minutes with the remaining $50. Kudos to their customer support.

chatmasta 12y ago

These business models usually face a problem of one ad view not being enough to incentivize someone to watch it. I like the penny auction spin you put on that. Clever. That said, is your ad network aware of this and okay with it? How do you verify these are real viewers? There are a lot of "attack" vectors here... automated servers + proxies, or even just somebody with a clickbot on their home computer cycling through videos and buying an item once its price goes below what they can sell it for elsewhere? Also, why would your users not just buy giftcards at any number of the discount gift sites, many of which offer higher discounts than you, without the need to watch a video? I'm very curious about the economics here, because I find it hard to imagine you could win all these "startup of the month" type accolades without thinking this through.

galuggus 12y ago

Who do you use for your ad network?