iusethis: the Next Big Thing in Mac Shareware? Arne and Marcus on Thinking Different
Arne and Marcus are the guys behind the new software tracking site, iusethis, first publicly unveiled in an earlier feature on this blog and now off to a running start thanks to some additional secondary publicity by TUAW and Digg coverage. With its unique "I use this" feature, iusethis has the opportunity to offer a significant challenge to MacUpdate, VersionTracker, and other established competitors in a crowded market. In this interview, we talk about how it's been going in the past week, what they plan for the site's future, and what makes iusethis different from its rivals, when differentiation will be key to its success.
So, with a post here, TUAW's news and a front-page Digg, iusethis got a lot of attention for a public beta. How's that been going for you guys?
Marcus: It's been pretty unreal for us. We'd never expected the level of traffic we've seen so soon. We already have more than 4000 registered users.
And as noted, that's in public beta in really early form. What kind of features should users expect to see in the upcoming weeks?
Marcus: The most important focus for our work on the site right now is stabilizing the current featureset. We have experienced issues with search, but most of those should be ironed out by now.
Arne: Recommendation is a hard one to hit on the head, but we are working hard creating a system that works well.
Marcus: Other things on our drawing board once those issues are resolved are things such as keeping track of your app versions on machines, and adding even more RSS views. We also want to support Sparkle appcasts, to ease the work for application developers.
Another area is comments. We want to improve the moderation system, as well as add support for comment replies. Lots of small stuff like that to make the user experience even better.
Arne: We'll try to keep you updated through our blog as we keep adding new features. We want iusethis to be a living site that grows with the needs of the community.
Sounds good! Now, one thing that I've been curious about is the fact that the site launched with an OSX subdomain, with the implication that there are plans to expand into other platforms. When should users expect to start seeing Windows apps, Linux apps, etc.?
Arne: Different platforms are obviously in the works, but we will not be opening iusethis up for other platforms until we are happy with the featureset and stability of the osx version.
Marcus: As Mac users ourself, our own satisfaction is obviously most important to us.
It definitely seems like you guys are trying to go after the big two right now: MacUpdate and VersionTracker. Both have been battling it out for ages, but iusethis is the first to have a true, clear unique feature. Do you think this differentiation will help it power past both software tracking sites?
Arne: The reason why we made iusethis is because we didn't like the model of VT and MU, and we find it hard to find good apps. We don't trust their rating system, and we think that it is hard to find good app on those sites.
Marcus: We believe that your friends are your best resource for finding new apps, so we are putting a lot of effort into creating a system that lets users see what new apps your friends start using.
In addition to working on improving the iusethis user experience, we're working on tools to make it easier for users and developers to use and display iusethis content on their own sites.
iusethis enters into a crowded marketIt sounds like gaining users won't be a problem, but of course a lot of users can also create problems. I'm sure as the activity on the site goes up and users stream in, the operating costs are becoming substantial. Do you ever plan to offer subscription services like MU and VT? Or do you think the site will be able to pay for itself with ads, as does, for example, Digg?
Arne: We are exploring different models to increase revenue to support the site, but we are confident that iusethis will remain free to use both for developers and end users.
Marcus: We are also eagerly awaiting our site to be fully indexed by Google, so we can provide better targeted ads.
MU and VT depend on developers adding their own apps (*correction, both sites do allow user submissions), but you've gone the route of letting any user add apps they see missing on the site. How has that worked out? It seems like a great short-term strategy for acquiring a complete database, but have developers raised concerns of not having control over their own apps?
Arne: The interest in the site has been amazing, we were expecting maybe 300 apps to be added during the first week, instead we have 1300 apps now. We are putting together a moderation team now that will do some of the maintenance work.
Marcus: We are however encouraging developers to claim/add their apps and maintain them. We are talking to a group of developers now about how we can serve them best, and it is very important for us to have the support of the mac developer community.
Sounds like it's going great for you guys, we'll keep in contact for the official launch. Good luck, and thanks for the interview!
Arne: Thank you too! It has been an amazing week, and we are thankful for all the feedback we have been receiving, please keep it coming! We love our users!
Marcus:If you voice a concern with us in the comments, you can be 100% certain that it will be at least read and considered.
Comments
Up until this point, there have been 13 responses to “iusethis: the Next Big Thing in Mac Shareware? Arne and Marcus on Thinking Different”:
Thanks for the interivew. It's nice to hear from the guys behind iusethis. I agree your friends are one of the best sources to find new apps. Often times I'll ask people I know what apps they recommend for a task. Now this has just become that much easier. Can't wait to see the recommendations feature. Keep up the good work!
One thing I really had to question with this site is:
"Just because everybody likes something does that actually make it good"
I mean a lot of people liked Britney Spears, The Da Vinci Code and Friends yet some wouldn't consider those desirable at all. Which worries me when I see these sites like this and Digg using the "big numbers are good" philosophy.
A more relervent example would be if the site was popular then 10,000 people could use iPhoto, but only 200 use 3rdPartyPhoto (which has just enough extra to make it essential to the high end amateur market) but few would give it the time of day when the distance between the two is so great.
Perhaps the site should use its statistics to generate like "Hot New Applications" lists for ones which have seen bursts in growth.
Or if its truly inspired by "friends know best" then using a tree of separation between users and their friends to show what applications are hot in your user group.
Oh and make your login system less annoying and make it actually remember me because it has yet to do that even once.
It is kind of boring that 6 out of 10 on the top list of apps are bundled with Mac OS X. I'd love the site to grow into a recommendation system more than an extensive database. I do not need to be recommended to try Mail or Safari or iTunes, I'll just open up my applications folder for that. It should be more about finding those little gems of software you wouldn't have found otherwise.
James,
I completely agree with you, and your britney spears analogy is on the money *and applies to most pop music today*.
This model, unfortunately, means that more people will continue to use the popular apps, and less known/used apps, regardless of their quality, functionality, featureset, whatever...will stay at the bottom of the list. This is discouraging to developers, and almost as bad, to people like me who are looking to see what the new little guy came I think that your user-separation idea is a great way to help tighten up the model of this application. Hopefully the developers catch our comments here and take them to heart!
Very cool, thanks. It's always good to find another well done Mac-cenctric site.
Sorry, but there's really very little difference between "digging" a software listing and sorting the software listing by download count and/or ratings. If you say you can't trust MacUpdate's ratiging system, then it seems you also can't trust a "digg." At least with a user review it takes effort to write and perform. And if you say that effort is what goes against the ability to find things because most people don't want to take the time to post a review, then just look at the download count numbers.
Of course, we've thought about the digg model for software, but I don't see any benefit to it over combined user reviews and download counts. Thus I see it as just another rating option that crowds things.
QUOTE: Arne: The reason why we made iusethis is because we didn’t like the model of VT and MU, and we find it hard to find good apps. We don’t trust their rating system, and we think that it is hard to find good app on those sites.
Hi Phill. This language in this statement quoted below is a bit misleading. Neither MU nor VT depend on developer submissions. It is nice when to do so, but not needed.
Also, MacUpdate has allowed users to submission software since day one, and continue to do so: macupdate.com/submission.
QUOTE: MU and VT depend on developers adding their own apps, but you’ve gone the route of letting any user add apps they see missing on the site. How has that worked out?
Phill Ryu
That's true Joel, I'll add a correction to the article.
you could claim the same for digg. "just cause 5000 people like this story, doesn't mean the other 150000 users on digg like it too"
you can look at the popular ones, but you might have to explore yourself still...
it's still better than MU/VT and their horrid subscriber-only rating system. most apps have only one rating and turn out to be 1/5 or 5/5...
I don't really buy the comparison between a site like versiontracker and iusethis. I use both sites right now and for completely different reasons. and unless the feature set of either site is not going to change dramatically i will keep on doing that. iusethis is a great way to find new apps that i don't know about yet. because it offers more than just a name on the main site as well as the number of users using the app i can browse around and find new apps. versiontracker on the other hand tells me if an app has been updated something which is extremely useful to know. right now i can see versiontracker adding additional app info to make that site more valuable to me. I don't know yet how iusethis could add the update functionality to its site which is more driven by newly added apps.
People are interested in information about certain products that helps better assess quality and potential usefulness regardless of (or beyond) popularity.
Many "rating" sites/systems/services don't offer types of criteria and filtering mechanisms that can better help determine relevance to someone's particular experience, needs, and interests. Often participants have little or no control over what personally taints those services for them, such as excessive amateurish and emotionally extreme biased ratings/comments.
Reducing unwanted distractions and increasing ways to manage unavoidable bias can help a service have broader/deeper value and hopefully attract more active participation from people who otherwise wouldn't bother.
Similar to Carsten, my reasons for using MU, VT and iusethis will vary based on unique features each has to offer (and is lacking) without it necessarily becoming an either/or comparison contest.
Another Mac (+ Linux + Win) Digg style website:
Glenn Wolsey
July 19th, 2006 at 2:10amFirst comment! Woooooo!