Show HN: Scoutzie, 444 best mobile designers for hire.

http://www.scoutzie.com/HN

by kirillzubovsky • 14 years ago

158 86 14 years ago

alexpenny• 14 years ago

Nice work! Now only if there were an equivalent for developers.

We'll consider it ;) I think Github and Stack come close, but there you still need to know what you're looking for. InterviewStreet does a good job at pre-filtering candidates. Non-the-less, we'll keep that in mind!

BadassFractal3• 14 years ago

That'd be especially useful for when you're looking for consulting gigs and other temporary projects. I'd use it :)

lilbear3• 14 years ago

What about Elance?

hugorodgerbrown• 14 years ago

Check out yunojuno.com. Similar, but different. I know the guys involved and they are hoping to build a community of freelance designers & developers, using peer recommendations as the glue. In project-led business (e.g. agencies), the 'Hollywood' model of bringing together the right team at at the right time _should_ prevail. That's what they are hoping to enable - giving power / control back to the freelancers themselves.

vj44• 14 years ago

Great job scoutzie!

frantzdy_romain• 14 years ago

Liking it :) Good work

vinhboy• 14 years ago

Every time I click "show more designers", it brings me back to the top. I think you forgot a "return false;"

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Yep. See above, the trick with javascript:void worked. Thanks for the bud reporting!

mingfu• 14 years ago

Scoutzie is a mobile design website made with the design community in mind. IMO thats what makes them stand out.

mciarrocchi• 14 years ago

Great idea! I love this type of projects, and mobile is a great niche to work on nowadays. Some feedback: it's a bit annoying that the "Show more ???" ajax buttons send you everytime to the top of the page.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

We fixed that. Thanks for letting us know!

bherms2• 14 years ago

Looks cool. On the show more designers button, change the href from "#" to "javascript:void(0);"

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Thanks! For some reason this worked fine all morning, but then of course I found a way to break it right before pushing. Thanks again!

mtrimpe• 14 years ago

Also, from the post signup confirmation mail you're redirected to Vinova.sg rather than Scoutzie when you click on 'Continue to our website.'

pavingways• 14 years ago

JS pseudo-protocol is bad practice

bherms2• 14 years ago

This is pretty much only due to IE6 problems with using it. Given that mostly everyone is finally dropping IE6, I don't see how it's a problem anymore.

dcope• 14 years ago

Looks neat, but clicking the "shuffle" button completely kills the back button.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Noted. Will look into that. Tnx!

jamesoey• 14 years ago

Nice job Scoutzie! It's a great way to connect high quality designers with companies and developers who need them.

BadassFractal3• 14 years ago

Still not fully sure how the model works. You announce that your project needs a designer on this site and you get to pick a designer?

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Designers get to pick you, should they consider the project worthy of their time/interest.

BadassFractal3• 14 years ago

Kirill, would a project hitching one of your designers as full-time co-founder be against some Scoutzie rules / be frowned upon?

jimg• 14 years ago

Yeah, the site is real pretty - but I have no idea what the site is offering. I understand dribble / 99designs / crowdspring .. but how exactly am I partnering with 444 designers? How does the interview process work? How long does the matching process typically take? How much is this gonna cost me (cheap, like 99 designs, or market rates?) Does this support the no-spec initiative?

jenntoda6• 14 years ago

We just happen to have 444 designers right now. We're a designers curated community where our designers invite other designers to join us based on their merits.

Right now, we allow you to post a simple project request. It's like a job board. Except, since our site is curated and only our designers get to see it - your respondents will be from vetted designers, not just any random Joe who says he can draw. We made sure you get qualified leads - we leave you to move forward with the designer as the two of you agree to.

We do not believe in asking anyone to work for free.

kyro3• 14 years ago

Really nice. My only suggestion would be to show more designs above the fold – perhaps make the current image rotate with a few others.

Do you say 444 because that's all you have signed up currently, or are you restricting it to that number? I think it'd be interesting to see what would happen if you did the latter, almost as if you were curating top talent, something like an agency. Imagine if 37signals kept the number of designers in each price bracket it represented on Sortfolio to only 20 or so. A part of me thinks those design firms would have gotten a lot more business than they would have otherwise.

jenntoda6• 14 years ago

It's a designer curate designer approach. The number is not limited, but each new designer can only join by getting invited another designer already listed on Scoutzie.

Instead of limiting the total number for the top 20, the bar is at "awesome": more than 444 designers can be awesome, each in their own right.

kyro3• 14 years ago

Ah, so like Dribbble.

No doubt there are more than 20 awesome designers out there, but from a client's point of view, I would think the zero-sum nature of a top X list would do a bit more to ensure that the designers are worth their weight. Think of it like Billboard's Top 10/20/100. I'm not saying this model would be better, just that it would be interesting to see how this sort of presentation would influence a potential client's perception of quality.

yakshaving• 14 years ago

Nice work Kirill - As a designer, you've really done a great job creating a site that I think people would want to actually use on a regular basis.

3ds2• 14 years ago

If you have so many awesome mobile designers, maybe put one to work on your own site and create a responsive layout that works on a mobile device! This fixed width layout doesn't help prove your point.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Maybe you could get lost ;)

3ds2• 14 years ago

It's valid constructive criticism. I realize that didn't come out right, but you should really work on that, it's not even all that complicated to get that page to display nicely with css mediaqueries

redslazer• 14 years ago

Adding a smilie face to the end of a rude comment does not make it acceptable. ;)

superkinz• 14 years ago

It's a pretty looking website, you hired a good designer to help you skin it Kirill. Nice.

What's the main difference between you and dribbble? They let you people message designers about projects too, no?

Good luck!

yumraj• 14 years ago

Curious, what's your revenue model? Your terms mention Our basic service is free, and we offer paid upgrades for advanced features.

So, do the designers need to pay a fee to be listed, when they receive a message from a client etc.?

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

There is no fee for designers to list their work. We plan to keep it as designer-friendly as possible.

gmurphy2• 14 years ago

I'd really love it if someone could make it as as easy to buy design help as it is to buy stock photography.

There is an astronomical difference between the effort required to buy tens of thousands of dollars worth of imagery, and the effort required to buy tens of thousands of dollars worth of someone's time. The former is a matter of a cart and credit card, the latter requires lengthy emails, contracts, legal approvals, timesheets, and all other sorts of mumbo jumbo and for most projects, is enough work that I often just don't bother.

Though those roadblocks are there to protect both parties, I suspect that there's an artificially large delta between cost and risk.

aaronblohowiak• 14 years ago

>to buy design help as it is to buy stock photography

Buying designs is easy. Buying commercial photographer's time is in the same ballpark as a designer's.

"Design on tap" is something larger companies with a standing contract / retainer can have. If you reach out to a larger design firm in your area and establish a relationship, you can cultivate this sort of relationship.

gmurphy2• 14 years ago

My problem is that I already have (many) of those relationships, but because of these difficulty issues, I'm stuck in those relationships.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

I am going to write a blog post about this one day. You are not the first person suggesting this, but once you start digging into what's involved, the variability is huge.

rorrr• 14 years ago

There are sites like 99designs - for a fixed price you get dozens (or hundreds) of designers working on your project, you pick the best one, and the author gets paid.

jenntoda6• 14 years ago

And the 99 others who did work for you too, did not.

99designs also minimizes communication and interaction. Yes, this makes things easier for you, but designers are basically left to guess in the dark. It's a spray and pray approach that really goes against the word "design".

Yes, there will always be a place for 99designs. On Scoutzie, we believe that there should also be a place where a designer is valued by his merits, can be given the opportunity to apply his creativity, and be paid for his work.

PufferBuffer3• 14 years ago

Once in a blue moon you may be able to get a decent design from 99, but if you browse around their site (which has been made really hard lately), most of the work is of mediocre quality. I doesn't do "design" justice.

ra• 14 years ago

Have you seen http://www.tweaky.com/ (only yesterday announced investment from sitepoint/99designs)

hcarvalhoalves• 14 years ago

to buy design (...)

You don't buy design because it's not an asset. It's part of the process.

MaxGabriel• 14 years ago

He didn't say "buy design" he said "buy design help." He's looking for a contractor, and just doesn't like dealing with the legal/accounting/recruiting issues.

PufferBuffer3• 14 years ago

That's true. Design is a process and a complicated one too. It's very hard to just buy 1 unit of design. That's precisely why many designers prefer to work on projects, rather than per hour. Once you've settled on a project and set the price, the complexity goes away.

pearkes• 14 years ago

Please make the signup form[1] transmit passwords, emails and names over SSL.

It appears you're using Heroku, check out the docs for how to do this here: https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/ssl

[1] http://www.scoutzie.com/signup

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

I do and will do. How bad is it?

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Ha. got down voted for that response. I think it came out wrong. I mean to say that "we do {host on heroku} and we will {implement the ssl)". How bad is it, was meant as a "what are the implications?" question.

I am going to work on answering questions properly next time. Thanks!

cemregr• 14 years ago

Would be great to see actual screenshots as opposed to blurred photos of hands holding iPhones showing screenshots.

dave1619• 14 years ago

You should really add some screens or a video demo of what you're supposed to do. I signed up but seems like I'm required to post a project. But what happens when I post a project? Do designers bid? How long? Or do they contact me? How? What's the process?

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Dave, this is on our top priority to add. Thank you!

newobj• 14 years ago

If your business is based around mobile design, for gods sake give your site a mobile design!

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Would you be so kind as to explain why it is important for us at this stage?

lilbear3• 14 years ago

It's not that hard to do. I just started coding two years ago and can make a responsive code layout with my eyes closed. If you are trying to sling mobile design, your website should be mobile as well. Kinda lose credit when you don't.

benblodgett• 14 years ago

I like this idea of collective, less-organized entities. I worked at a design agency for 3 years and found that every designer who came immediately started designing outside of their process. I think a system like this allows each individual designer the ability to implement their own process and creativity without management influence.

I would urge you to take this to the next step and unify accounting. This would allow customers to feel as if they were hiring a traditional firm, and would relish in the idea of being able to select out of 444 designers and then work directly with them.

matan_a• 14 years ago

i'm curious because right after i registered, i received an email with the subject "Scouts: Please confirm subscription" which goes to a listserv and has a reply to: will -at- vinova.sg.

What gives?

benrequena3• 14 years ago

Yes. That seemed pretty deceptive to me too. Nowhere did I agree or appear to agree to signup for a listserv or newsletter. I probably would have, but the surprise email in my inbox makes me not trust this group now.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Hey matan, sorry about that. Somehow our test email got associated with the mail chimp. We'll need to fix that. Thanks for letting us know!

EternalFury2• 14 years ago

So, $100 to get a chance to contract with a quality designer? Umm...

benrequena3• 14 years ago

That was my first thought. I actually have a need to partner with a mobile developer on a project, but paying $100 for the chance to find someone who's personality, communication, experience, and rate are compatible is, well, Ummm...

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Actually, you guys can contact them directly. You could, however, post a project on the private shared board, in case you want to expose it to more than just the person you are going to contact. This way, you get the benefit of talking to the person you want, as well as (maybe) hearing from others who might like to talk to you.

EternalFury2• 14 years ago

BTW, I think a site like this begs for another site offering the services of those who take Photoshop comps and turn them into actual iOS or Android UIs. Because, while Photoshop comps can be totally awesome, there is a humongous gap between them and an actual UI.

rmason• 14 years ago

They need to let you search by geographic area and also for verified customers to give validation to individual designers. Too few had samples of their work.

majorapps• 14 years ago

It would be great to know how much each designer charged.

PufferBuffer3• 14 years ago

I second that!

MortenK• 14 years ago

Really bad attitude from both the founder, and the Scoutzie employee badmouthing 99 designs. If there's something to learn from this thread, it's how not to reply to criticism.

benrequena3• 14 years ago

I was just going to post something similar. It's jaw-dropping to see the kinds of retorts that kirillzubovsky is giving. Even if the original comments are snarky in their own right, to quip back with "Maybe you could get lost", and "A little jealous, perhaps?", is absolutely brand killing not to mention disrespectful. If I were a mobile developer I would not want to be associated with this startup in any capacity.

mnicole4• 14 years ago

I was pretty stoked to wake up to the jealousy comment this morning. "Why would we make a mobile site for a site about mobile?" got me good too.

What wonderful ways to respond to people you're trying to profit off of.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Ben, you're spot on. I shouldn't be responding like that.

As I explained to Nicole (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4262188), I saw the original comment as an offense on the quality of Scoutzie-listed designers and I take any such offense very personally. We spend a lot of time talking to the designers, getting to know them, looking to understand how they work and what they want to get out of their design careers. When I see a negative comment about the site or about our user base , I see it as a negative comment about each one of our users. It hurts me because I see these users as real people, not just user ids.

Now, I can see that 'mnicole' wasn't out to get us, and it was wrong of me to engage in a hostile manner myself.

Unfortunately, as one comments irritates your skin, it's really easy to quickly overreact with others. I will get better at this.

Lastly, thank you for giving the feedback.

kirillzubovsky23• 14 years ago

Some comments were indeed uncalled for and I apologize for that. Please see below those comments for the followups.

As per the 99designs, we are not badmouthing them at all. There are designers who are willing to do design at a chance they will not get paid and let's face it, most designers on 99designs don't get paid because only the winner takes the money. This is terrible for designers who put in the hours of work and then don't get reimbursed of it. This isn't always good for clients either. Given that each designer can only spend limited time (knowing they might (most likely won't) get paid). As a result, most designers end up with no $ in the pockets and clients end up with work that could be improved upon.

All said, there are clients who use 99designs and there are designers who work on these projects. 99Designs as a company is doing well and we are happy for them. But, we don't have to support them because we prefer to encourage great design and to encourage great designers to be paid for their work.

Show HN: Scoutzie, 444 best mobile designers for hire.

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