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Kitestring: An app that checks up on you

63 pointsby stepstepover 11 years ago

16 comments

morganteover 11 years ago
It&#x27;s sad that a service like this exists. Taking a walk isn&#x27;t a horribly dangerous activity and it&#x27;s sad that our society has conditioned us to believe it might be.<p>Live a little.<p>EDIT: Sorry for the overly negative comment. I&#x27;d never personally want this, but Afforess makes a great comment about alternative demographics.
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lowglowover 11 years ago
I can see this going really wrong -- I tend to forget things. Also, the value prop needs a bit of work. Show me the app or something. I want to feel like I trust this app.<p>Also, is this app profiting off of fear mongering? It&#x27;s an interesting sector of technology that has sold to millions of people around the world. [See: Antivirus, Home Security Sytems, Insurance, etc]
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wikydover 11 years ago
I love this idea! I wanted something like this for kiteboarding, actually, which an interesting coincidence given the name.<p>Some UX feedback: You should warn the user in advance that you are going to send an SMS to their phone number to confirm the number. After getting the first SMS to confirm my account, I started to add my emergency contact. I stopped, though, because I was worried that you might send an SMS to them asking to confirm their number, status as emergency contact, etc. The UI doesn&#x27;t make it clear what will happen when I add them as a contact.
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jnorthropover 11 years ago
While the concept of this app is noble, why would anyone give up there phone number, full name and location to a site that says absolutely nothing about what they will do with that data.<p>There is a privacy policy and terms of use on the site, but those only cover use of the website itself and mostly just protect the site creator.<p>There is a significant revenue opportunity to gather this information and sell it and if that is the intent it should be clearly stated. If that isn&#x27;t the intent, then they are potentially losing users by not yelling that from the rooftops.
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stepstepover 11 years ago
Hi everyone! I made this app, and I just added an FAQ with some of your questions: <a href="https://www.kitestring.io/faq" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.kitestring.io&#x2F;faq</a>
fit2ruleover 11 years ago
Or .. you could use a Fall Detector app:<p><a href="https://play.google.com/store/search?q=fall%20detector&amp;c=apps" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;play.google.com&#x2F;store&#x2F;search?q=fall%20detector&amp;c=app...</a><p>There are plenty of them. They watch your activity, if you&#x27;re moving around, and if the phone detects you have fallen over, it sends alerts to your configured SMS&#x2F;Twitter contact.
dapakover 11 years ago
I wish there was a bit more depth to describing this service before I just hand over a name and number to it.
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ccmaover 11 years ago
So what is this? A text only service? A web app? Native phone app?<p>I am on a tablet, so maybe the site isn&#x27;t showing me all there is to see but I can&#x27;t figure out what this this is without signing up. All there is to read is three sentences in the hero.
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gfalcaoover 11 years ago
Beautiful product, both aesthetically and conceptually. Very simple and honest, very few apps start like that, but I think the ones who do, legitimately deserve success.<p>Keep up with the great work!
rgbrgbover 11 years ago
Strange coincidence! A friend on fb posted a message tonight along the lines of &quot;going to a new friend&#x27;s house, if I don&#x27;t check in by midnight, call the police&quot;. I&#x27;ve definitely let a friend know when making a craigslist or airbnb transaction. I probably would rather just let a friend know where I was going but it&#x27;s nice there&#x27;s an alternative and I&#x27;m sure this service can be run rather cheaply.
kitcarover 11 years ago
There is a Toronto startup that plays in this space for the enterprise - <a href="http://www.guardly.com" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.guardly.com</a>
Centigonalover 11 years ago
Livesafe[1], although not as straightforward or elegant, is a general life safety app that already does this and is already somewhat well-established. (This counts as a plug, I guess, since I know people who work on that app)<p>[1] <a href="http://www.livesafemobile.com/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.livesafemobile.com&#x2F;</a>
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telecudaover 11 years ago
It&#x27;s a shame to see so many negative comments. MIT compsci student has good idea to help people, has a clean and simple UI&#x2F;UX that I was able to test very quickly, open-sources the code. Even if you have no need for it, I have respect for attempts like these.
slackpadover 11 years ago
If you&#x27;re on a large display the Get Started button seems like it&#x27;s broken if you don&#x27;t notice the color change down below. I noticed after I clicked it a few times.<p>Interesting idea!
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zapt02over 11 years ago
US only? Doesn&#x27;t recognize my european phone number.
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svankieover 11 years ago
Registration doesn&#x27;t work here in Argentina. :-(
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