Pixate - beautiful native mobile apps with CSS

I'm not sure I absorbed the message as it was supposed to be put across. The video showed a (seemingly) quite advanced prototype, and they expect to be able to ship before the end of the year. So what is the $200k for? Seemingly to "make it happen" but it appears to be happening already, so it's kickstarting a hefty salary?<p>If I did somehow miss the point and this seems like a cynical response then obviously I apologise in advance, but that's how it came across.<p>Edit, cancel the nicety... I just saw that it's retailing for $299. It all feels rather cynical. Perhaps I have too much of a rose-tinted view of the attraction of Kickstarter?

Feedback on the Listr (ugh, that name) re-imagining: the little icons weren't particularly informative in the original, but at least there was some text to try and explain. Now I get to guess what each icon means, plus instead of everything fitting on one screen, you apparently must scroll down to select e.g. "Projects".<p>By the way, what is up with every project talking about "beautiful"? "Beautiful Javascript", "Beautiful native apps", "Beautiful text icons", etc. Is this just the Steve Jobs school of selling?

So does it <i></i>compile<i></i> to Objective-C? It sounds more like an 'engine' that is a part of your actual app and interprets the CSS realtime. Sounds more processor intensive than just loading up flat graphics. (not an expert, please chime in)

200k is a lot. I can't see how you need so much money (unless you want to add another supercar to the video)?

Looks good and all, but I really don't think it's worth $200K. And $150K more for Android support? Where's all this money going to go?

This feels like a marketing fail. Kickstarter is supposed to be about helping people create things who would normally not have the resources to do so. Impressing the audience by showing off expensive luxury items (player piano, supercars, etc) does not help this cause.<p>They also failed to really communicate how the app changes your normal development workflow. Does it replace interface builder processes? Besides styling with CSS, how does it help in creating complex vector elements that would normally be made in Photoshop? Is it a standalone dev environment or a lot of pieces? Can you mix assets (pixel and vector)?

This looks similar to Qt Quick / QML, which is actually very cool. <a href="http://doc.qt.nokia.com/4.7/qdeclarativeintroduction.html" rel="nofollow">http://doc.qt.nokia.com/4.7/qdeclarativeintroduction.html</a>

The CSS part is particularly interesting, and has a ton of potential. But frankly, I don't like nor would I use a proprietary library like this.<p>Also, I don't see why they need Kickstarting at all. If they are going to sell the product, then sell the product. They appear to already have a product that is finished or near completion, and are in Y Combinator and thus have funding. It doesn't make sense.<p>My real hope is that one day we get an open source tool like this for writing native UIs in CSS.

I doubt they will reach $200k, but this is sorely needed for iOS apps. If they had launched this without kickstarter, and at a reasonable price, I bet developers would be flocking to it.

To me, this kind of product needs crowdsourced equity financing (that's becoming legal soon, right?), not Kickstarter-style.<p>I have a hard time imagining there are, say, 2000 people willing to pay $100 in advance for this with no guarantees. This isn't a sexy video game which can build up lots of viral demand...<p>Despite that, I wish them the best of luck! From what I understand, CSS-style formatting of native iOS components is sorely needed...

I know I'm missing something here, but if they get enough money, they'll add Android support - but doesn't Android already do this (not with CSS, but with XML, like everything else in Android)<p><a href="http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/themes.html" rel="nofollow">http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/ui/themes.html</a>

While I'm totally stoked for seeing this concept come to fruition, these are the <i>worst</i> reward tiers I've ever seen on a Kickstarter campaign.<p>The $5 minimum should be $10 or $15, and there needs to be a tier between this one at the $50 tier.<p>And the rewards themselves? For $2k, I get "Access to a private forum to influence product direction." For two grand, I can't get a phone call to the CEO? I get access to some forum?

Currently there are very few styling options for iOS and Android app dev. That results in an incredible amount of grunt work that really shouldn't be necessary. At least if you make apps commercially, a quality app that solves this would be huge. It looks like they are adding a lot of features beyond styling, and even moving beyond mobile... so hey, no question, sign me up : ).

I agree with all the current opinions, but I still donated, an iOS dev friend of mine really misses the three20 libraries ability to apply CSS.<p>I like the idea of doing it properly but to be honest I'd expect that someone would release an open source version that does something similar that I can contribute back to.

here's a message I sent on Kickstarter:<p>I'm very impressed by your demo, but I'm also skeptical about performance, how well this integrates into existing apps, and what happens to my apps built on your framework if you go out of business or get acquired.<p>Along the same lines, I'd love to be able to pitch this to my clients, but I can't in good conscience without knowing that they're never going to get screwed in the process.<p>Can you address these concerns? I'd love to back your project, but I need to know I'm not going to be left holding the bag in 12-18 months.<p>Thanks! Aaron

Why in the world would you put a ferrari into a _Kickstarter_ video?

When committing to CSS, isn't the natural way to go the HTML5 + CSS3 way? Currently it is all about performance. I would like to see better solutions than phonegap and titanium.

I'm interested in how animations work with Pixate. Would they also have to be in CSS, if not, then how smooth/seamless would transitions be? Looks good so far though, but 200k?

is this not backwards in any ways?

Does this affect performance in any way when the app is running?<p>Also, does it provide any benefit over Quartz2d other than familiarity that comes with CSS?

CSS is the new native. (Initialized by Apple, the walled garden company, can you believe it!)