nolastan

SEEKING WORK | US (San Francisco)

https://stanfordrosenthal.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/nolastan

I've been designing and building websites for 17 years—it's what I love to do. Specifically, I am passionate about empowering climate innovators through impactful UX design and a minimalist approach to technology.

Design: Figma, Canva Tech: HTML/CSS, Tailwind, Javascript (JS), Ruby on Rails, Ghost blog platform, some React/Node experience

Open to flat-race pricing for well-scoped projects

SEEKING WORK | US (San Francisco)

https://stanfordrosenthal.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/nolastan

I've been designing and building websites for 17 years—it's what I love to do. Specifically, I am passionate about empowering climate innovators through impactful UX design and a minimalist approach to technology.

Design: Figma, Canva Tech: HTML/CSS, Tailwind, Javascript (JS), Ruby on Rails, Ghost blog platform, some React/Node experience

Open to flat-race pricing for well-scoped projects

stanford@stanfordrosenthal.com

I haven't done enough research yet on UK. I will circle back to this comment once I do.

I did have a user sign up from Canada, but it's so much simpler there that it probably doesn't make sense for Canadians to pay for Mel:

  1. Fill out the CMA Do Not Mail form: https://cmadnm.cawebhosting.ca/submit.asp

  2. Put a note on your mailbox that you don't want to receive Canada Post Neighbourhood Mail.

While I don't intend to register as a non-profit (there's CatalogChoice already), I could see registering as a Benefit Corporation / B Corp. Would that hold any weight, or would you still just view that as "an SF tech startup"?

There is no pitch deck for Mel as I don't intend to raise VC funding – precisely because I don't want to be pressured into doing something that goes against my values like selling user data.

I'm in the process of reaching out to existing customers, with an aim of getting some reviews on TrustPilot. Do you have any other ideas?

I accept that there's a certain percent of folks who will not trust me with their address, so I'm not trying to change anyone's mind or pressure anyone into signing up if that's the case.

Back when I worked at SaveUp, and we gave real cash prizes to people every day, we always had people claiming we were a scam. We even posted videos to YouTube of our selection and giveaway process, and posted new testimonials to our site every single day, but certain folks simply couldn't be convinced.

The image with the bird and the mailbox I generated directly from DALL•E. The asset on the Stripe checkout page for the Assistant plan I generated using Midjourney. All of these assets are placeholders while my partner is working on drawing a custom mascot to represent Mel.

In the Messages app, next to the text field, there is a camera icon.

That would be nice. However, the postal service is required to deliver your mail, and they make money by doing so. They have no interest in reducing mail and in fact have been advertising their “Every Door Direct Mail” service which is nearly impossible to opt out of. Look for “EDDM” label on mail and you’ll see what I mean.

Yes, for those looking to do it themselves, there's a how-to guide on the blog: https://blog.talktomel.com/blog/7-ways-to-unsubscribe-from-p...

Totally understand the privacy concern. If it helps, I'm a person, not a company—and I put my photo and personal links right on the homepage so folks can decide if they would like to trust me with this sensitive information.

Thanks! I created the initial MVP of Mel right after we shut down Remedy back in 2017, so the SMS-based UI was top-of-mind.

A great post-mortem on Remedy here: https://www.fastcompany.com/40483774/remedy-wanted-to-cut-pe...

+1 I have a plug-in Prius and I haven't put gas in the tank since January, when I drove 10 hours to visit family.

So it's like Algolia, with a UI baked in? How does ongoing support and maintenance work?

Love the simplicity and speed! Could totally see using this for our urban farm. However, the price point seems a bit high for these types of communities. I wonder if there could be other monetization strategies, such as "promoted profiles" within communities that members could pay for.

Love the simplicity. What is the "Tag URL"?

Looks amazing! As an avid Sketch user, it wasn't entirely clear to me that Abstract works with Sketch. My team has little patience for me trying out new design apps all the time, so Sketch compatibility is a must.

In fact, after a little cmd+F, it appears that Abstract only works with Sketch! If I were on my phone or more in a rush, I probably wouldn't have discovered that.

Nice work. I was a bit confused by the background video of someone apparently playing a video game. I didn't even realize this was for people who film their own live videos at first.

Perhaps you could focus on what the hobbyist broadcaster imagines being a professional broadcaster might look like (camera crew, nice lighting… I'm not the target here so not exactly sure what that would be).

My advice: make a list of all the reasons to stay in school. Go through each reason and determine if it's valid.

For me, after doing this, dropping out was an easy decision and I have no regrets. I'm more engaged and challenged each day at TaskRabbit than I ever was in class.

However, ensure you'll have no regrets about your college experience. I achieved my goals, tried new things, and got what I wanted out of college - it just didn't take me 4 years.

I'm a Junior Computer Science and Visual Design student at one of the top-20 Universities in the US.

"I want to... go to college and meet like minded folks" --> It has taken me three years to connect with a handful of students that share my interests. On the other hand, at one Startup Weekend I made just as many, arguably higher-quality, connections. Therefore, I would argue an event like Startup Weekend is a much better use of time and money than college.

"I want focus, and stop trying to solve everything and finishing nothing" --> I find that most course projects are turned in incomplete at the end of the term, and there is rarely motivation to continue working on an assignment after the course is over.