To reinforce this point, we did not have core competency to build an iPhone app and wanted to keep the project bootstrapped. Given the feedback here it seems an app would in fact make a big difference.
End of the day, probably users and a self-sustaining business model. This was/is a side project among friends so we're not expecting anything too crazy
We're definitely aware that site is uuuber slow. Because we're 100% bootstrapped (and not generating revenue) we recently scaled down from Engine Yard to a small instance on Slicehost. We figured we'd cut our costs while deciding what to do. EY was about $240/mth but 10x faster
It's possible. One thing we looked at was working with personal trainers, or programs like weight watchers. Another variation was to use mechanical turk to 'guesstimate' calorie counts and charge as a premium service
Awesome! That was great fun night. We've tried to hold true to our roots with quantified self/personal tracking. However, most feedback (here and from friends) suggests we pivot away from this
There's something really strange about personal tracking - it seems like such a good idea, full of great potential for people, and yet the same problem happens over and over again - people start using it, fall off and never pick up.
Agree with the iPhone app. We do have a basic Facebook integration that allows users to post to their feed. Also agree with deemphasizing the calorie/health aspects, though overtime, I still believe the stronger value prop for an app like this is to become the mint.com of eating rather than another food porn site. But, yes, in the near term more emphasis on social, food porn, etc is prob the way to go
There's already a lot of calorie-counting apps out there if that's what somebody is interested in. dailyburn.com, for instance, is pretty good. It's also a lot of work to replicate one of these since you'll need to enter a huge database of possible foods.
The problem with them is that counting calories is too damn much work, so adding an extra step, where you take a photo of your food and then count the calories in it, doesn't seem like a huge gain. On the other hand, I suppose if you had photos of everything you'd eaten you could more easily count the calories only once every couple of days.
Still, I think you'll need to decide between "food porn" and "healthy eating" rather than try both, since they're pretty much opposed.
I'm currently based in NYC, but thinking of moving to SF. I'm looking to join or start something though I could care less about the title I'm given. I don't code per se, but have an excellent sense of product, marketing and biz dev. I've raised angel and VC and sold one company. I can get shit done. A recent side project of mine is http://eat.ly. I'm open to whatever and have a few technical folks who'd join the right project I was involved with. Email in profile.
