Yeah, I have to agree: whether or not you can explain it to me here, that page does not explain to me what I'm buying, why I'd want to buy it, or what I can use it for exactly.<p>Seems cool, but better marketing is required.<p>*edit: See: <a href="https://tent.io/docs" rel="nofollow">https://tent.io/docs</a> -- that breakdown is actually one of the better explanations of any protocol I've ever seen. Clear, succinct, concise. Really a thing of beauty. Cupcake needs to be explained in the same way. Shoot, I wish everything was explained that well.
Others have mentioned that you should be more descriptive about your product. I have another suggestion:<p>The name and design of the site are at odds. Either change the design (show an increasingly full plate of cupcakes?) or the name. A green tree is _not_ what I was anticipating when I clicked on "cupcake.io".
One of the founders here-- We recently rebranded the service (used to be <a href="https://tent.is" rel="nofollow">https://tent.is</a>), which is still in alpha, to make the distinction between the hosting service and the Tent protocol clearer. This landing page was designed with some products that haven't launched yet in mind, so most of the copy is vague outside of that context. Honestly we weren't expecting any serious traffic until those apps launch later this year, so we've been focused on product, not marketing. (Most of the team is currently experiencing a power outage at home so we missed this being posted to HN as well.)
This is a terrible, terrible website. Not because of the design (which is pretty), but because I have <i></i>absolutely no clue<i></i> what you're offering. I know that you want $5/month (for what? Who knows?), that you're expanding the amount of storage that you have, and that "Cupcake is part of the growing Tent ecosystem." Oh....okay....WHAT THE F@#K IS THAT?!<p>You know those annoying TV commercials where you're left with no idea what product the commercial was trying to advertise? This is the web equivalent. Just horrible.
I so badly wanted this to be an api for ordering cupcakes.<p>From the description I couldn't tell what service is being sold but I'm fairly sure it isn't an api for cupcakes. Damn.
True story here: it occurred to me that it would be awesome if there was a customer-brings-their-own-storage protocol for cloud app backends. It would allow arbitrary apps to stay synchronized across devices, but the user would still control the data. And then I remembered that I was pretty sure I had heard about something like this.<p>And then it hit me, it was the Cupcake/Tent thing I had read about a couple weeks ago but had shrugged off because I didn't really understand the point from either webpage.<p>I just took a second look, and it seems that Tent actually does everything I had thought in my mind, but also goes well beyond, because it has a first-class notion of sharing. Then I revisited Cupcake and saw that I had actually overlooked the free tier when I first read this story.<p>Re-examining it all, I think this is absolutely revolutionary! Once people understand that they can actually own all their own data for a couple bucks a month and app writers realize they can achieve cloud synchronization with the customer bringing their own infrastructure, it could be a major shift in the whole multi-device app/social sharing economy. We can start seeing meta-apps that aggregate app content.<p>But first, both Tent and Cupcake need to find a much better way to portray what they provide, because neither site is capturing the promise...
Uhm. Ok?<p>Looked at page. No idea what I'm looking at.<p>Checked out Tent.io. Sorta understand.<p>Back to cupcake. Nope, thought I understood.<p>Sign up for free account. Still no idea. Oh well. Later.
"Everyday everyone creates more data by editing files, taking pictures, and sending messages."<p>'Everyday' should be 'Every day'. 'Everyday' is an adjective.
So, they promise 50gb cloud storage for $5/mo (not initially, but after you sign up and wait 4 years). That's about $5 at current S3 storage prices - <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/" rel="nofollow">http://aws.amazon.com/s3/pricing/</a><p>Why not "invest": unproven reliability and performance, uncertain future.