Review my startup: Mixlr

http://rfw.posterous.com/mixlr-on-hacker-news

by transmit101 • 16 years ago

54 31 16 years ago

rfw.posterous.com

jessor• 16 years ago

Great idea. You're solving a problem for quite a bunch of people. It looks pretty cool, too.

> Sorry, Windows and Linux users: we definitely have you in mind, but we want to get our Mac application perfect before we release for other platforms.

Only theoretically yet, though, since linux users probably feel the greatest pain there.

Anyways, best of luck! I'll be testing when a linux client is available :-)

jot• 16 years ago

If you're wondering what it does, it's like Justin.tv for sound - a super simple way to share live music.

... and it's awesome!

quizbiz• 16 years ago

Top notch design. The posterous doesn't do you justice. Great step by step sign up process. I just didn't like how it automatically opens up finder to browse for a pic (unless I accidentally clicked).

jasonkester• 16 years ago

All your buttons and links look disabled until you mouse over them. I kept finding myself stuck during signup, trying to figure out what information I was missing that would enable the Continue button.

I expected, once finally in, to find a site where I could listen to the aforementioned live/saved music. Since the page I saw was empty, I tried clicking on my username, which brought me to a page containing absolutely nothing except my username in a bigger font.

No links to anything at all.

Now what???

hassy• 16 years ago

I will use this.

One suggestion: give me a list of mixes to listen to right after I sign up. I had to go to your twitter page to find something.

bdickason• 16 years ago

One advantage I'd add to your Posterous is that the two main 'live' streaming sites (Ustream/JustinTv) don't accomodate audio very well. They're optimized for better video quality and as a DJ, I find that they mangle my music.

Now for some feedback! 1) The 'Create My account' button is dimmed out, even after I've completed the form!

2) The 'Password' tooltips aren't really that helpful because they don't give me any guidance as to how long my password should be. They're cute, but I had to hit 'submit' to find out that it had to be a minimum 6 characters.

3) The 'About' box on the signup page says something along the lines of 'If you're a DJ or a live act, Mixlr is for you!' I didn't find this very compelling compared to this line on your posterous: "If you are a DJ or part of a live act, you may have already found that it can be surprisingly hard to broadcast yourself live on the web." I would suggest swapping them :) I couldn't get back to the original signup page to get an exact quote.

4) Signup process is nice and easy! I didn't try the Fbook/Soundcloud integration but a brief blurb on why I would want to tie them together would be great. For example a cool picture of how the facebook integration would look (sharing your live stream with your friends!) would be ideal. Bonus points if you get a celebrity DJ to take the screenshot of his/her account :)

5) I liked being able to set my location on a map. Felt much more personal than just typing in my City/State into some text box (even though thats what I was really doing!)

6) I haven't received my e-mail yet but i'll try to post more feedback when I get in! :)

Thanks for posting your app here. Makes me super anxious to complete my app so I can post for some feedback :D

dolinsky• 16 years ago

I did receive my email, and here are some of my thoughts from that point on (I agree with most of the points above).

1) After completing the registration form, I was not immediately signed in. Before I got my email, I tried to log in and was told that my combination wasn't valid (it was). I then received the email, clicked on the link, and the resulting page told me 'link has expired'. I then closed both mixlr.com browser tabs that were open, clicked the link again and it took me to a page that said 'you are already logged in'. Weird session-y experience. I would expect to be logged in immediately and use the link to verify my email address.

2) I understand this is just getting off the ground, but do you plan on displaying a list of previously uploaded / currently playing streams?

3) Do you plan on establishing a 'public / private' capability so that certain streams would only be known by the passing around of the link?

Best of luck w/ the site.

grrrr• 16 years ago

Firstly, how is this different to or better than SoundCloud?

Secondly, I don't appear to be able to search for or find existing uploaded mixes, is this intentional or have I missed something?

transmit1015• 16 years ago

It's really quite different from SoundCloud. Mixlr is about sharing live (streaming) music, while SoundCloud is about moving MP3 and WAV files about the internet. There is some crossover of course but a completely different focus.

I will be building a search/discovery mechanism when there is more music to search for and discover :-)

p3ll0n• 16 years ago

I think search/discovery is going to be what really makes this service special. I imagine one day being able to see all live music being streamed from venues in my area at the moment, maybe even a link to the venue, the band's homepage, similar acts, etc.

Right now you have a great tool that helps artists connect with their existing fan base in a way that removes previous technological barriers and streamlines the process, but what about new potential fans?

flat_20• 16 years ago

How do I remove my account? It sounds like a nice idea but I'm on Windows and without the live upload feature I have to stick to recording to another laptop.

grk• 16 years ago

That's the single most annoying thing on most new webapps.

NathanKP• 16 years ago

Here are my questions about Mixlr (cross posted from the posterous blog):

Mixlr sounds like a great service. I have a few other questions though:

What is the quality of music stored by Mixlr? CD quality? MP3 quality? This is something audiophiles will be interested in.

Do you plan to convert to a paid service in the future to support yourself financially? If so what will happen to current members?

Will there be copyright problems if a DJ is playing songs, for instance, and then saves his performance on Mixlr? If the performance afterward gives public access to download copyright material you might run into some trouble with record companies.

transmit1015• 16 years ago

> What is the quality of music stored by Mixlr? CD quality? MP3 quality?

At present: 128kbps MP3 (near-CD quality), both streaming and stored. This is much higher than most streaming services but lower than SoundCloud. Both numbers may change in future depending on a number of factors.

> Do you plan to convert to a paid service in the future to support yourself financially

It is already a paid service, with free credit for new users. I haven't settled on the exact business plan however. A lot of people have suggested a free option at low bit-rate, which is an idea I find interesting.

kcbanner• 16 years ago

No Linux/Windows client? Fairly big turn off for those of us who can't afford turtlenecks.

transmit1015• 16 years ago

Bear with us, Windows and Linux support is in the pipeline.

jaxn• 16 years ago

Not enough vowels ;)

igorgue• 16 years ago

When I learn to do this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaoLbKWMwoU

I'll definitely use Mixlr.

snsr• 16 years ago

Tthe simplicity is beautiful.

A native mobile client (even if wifi-only) and a Flash desktop client would make this an absolute slam dunk. A discovery or "now playing" feature would of course be cool. The grayed-out color scheme (text:bg) can be a bit straining.

I would have killed for an app like this back in the day. It's actually kind of inspiring - makes me want to set up my decks again. Can't wait to give it a shot.

edkennedy2• 16 years ago

A startup that feels completely relevant to me! I can get back to you after I try my first live broadcast. I truly enjoy the integration with soundcloud, facebook and twitter. I think this is going to really be a key selling point, because of the ability to promote your streams right away. Is there a way to integrate the comments into your twitter/fb feeds? I hope so.

As someone who started out with shoutcast long ago sharing my dj mixes on two turntables and a microphone, I am extremely interested in the development of this project. Thanks for your innovation.

Johngibb• 16 years ago

I think that the white outline with such a light background has the effect of making the text appear blurry and hard to read.

illumin8• 16 years ago

Cool business model! A couple suggestions:

1. I'd like to be able to see pricing information before I sign up. This would be convenient because I don't want to sign up for something without knowing how much it will cost me.

2. An ad supported pricing option would be nice for those of us that don't want to pay anything. Bonus points if it doesn't insert audio ads, but instead uses Adwords in the listening interface or something similar.

3. The licensing agreement seems a little onerous. It sounds almost like I'm giving you complete royalty free ability to sell my music wherever you want. You should specify that I am only giving Mixlr.com the right to perform my music for the purpose of streaming to users of the Mixlr.com service, and for no other purposes. Serious musicians aren't going to use this service if it involves signing away in perpetuity their copyrights.

USER hereby grants Mixlr.com and its successors and assigns a worldwide, perpetual, non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free, fully paid up, license to use, copy, transmit or otherwise distribute, publicly perform, digitally perform, publicly display, distribute, stream, download and/or otherwise make USER’s Content available to other users of Mixlr.com’s Website and Services. USER also grants each and every other registered user of Mixlr.com’s Website a worldwide, perpetual, non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free, fully paid up, license to use, copy, transmit or otherwise distribute, publicly perform, digitally perform, publicly display, distribute, stream, download USER's content and/or otherwise to make USER’s Content available to other users of Mixlr.com’s Website and Services as set forth herein.

transmit1015• 16 years ago

Thanks. I take your point about the license: it's a pretty generic one. I will look into that.

mikerhoads• 16 years ago

I'm at work right now so I can't get in and play around too much but I'm wondering why your front page makes zero effort to explain what the site actually does. Sure most HN users would see the record logo and see the word mix in the site name and put 2 and 2 together but you have to assume less of the average person. Just a sentence describing the product would do wonders.

stef25• 16 years ago

Cool idea! Would love to hear a bit more about the technology & platform behind it.

lyime• 16 years ago

Mixlr looks great, seems like someone is finally taking live set broadcasting seriously. I co-founded Mugasha (http://mugasha.com) and we currently work with quite a few venues and DJs to broadcast their live events. Mostly video, sometimes audio only. We setup our own streaming infrastructure to handle stream but it's not our focus. Seems like we could definitely work together. Drop me a line at akshay at mugasha.com.

patrickryan• 16 years ago

I get an error message when uploading an .mp3:

"If you're sure your internet connection works, then we recommend you either use Google Chrome (this is the recommended option - you don't actually need Flash if you're using Chrome), or install Flash."

This statement confuses me since I am using Chrome, my connection is good, and I do have Flash installed.

transmit1015• 16 years ago

Hmmm. Thanks for reporting. Mixlr uses WebSockets when available (i.e., Chrome) and falls back to Flash, so this error probably means the WebSocket port was blocked for some reason, maybe a firewall. I agree the error message is a bit skewed in this case. I am going to do some more work to minimize this kind of problem, it's not perfect yet.

fizzfur• 16 years ago

looks interesting, I'm not sure the signup/intro page quite put across _why_ I should use the service enough, I only 'got it' a bit later. But as a set hosting service I would probably use it anyway.

few thoughts (some already covered):

  * buttons look disabled, I was waiting for them to un-ghost
  * the "skip" links should be more prominent during signup since at the time it slowed me down.
  * signup/design was generally very friendly
  * please don't alert me to sign-out, I know what I'm doing, and it's not that bad if I made the mistake

PS: enjoy my set http://mixlr.com/chrisfarms/euromuxer

fretlessjazz• 16 years ago

The recording geek in me absolutely loves that you've managed to insert XLR into a company name. Well done!

edkennedy2• 16 years ago

I think a twitter hashtag is essential here. The quality is great, and the dj's talented. The mixes I listened to I found on the mixlr twitter feed. I hope you plan on eventually having some way to search these mixes or some kind of directory.

Review my startup: Mixlr

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