Ask/Show IH: adding notes quickly from any device
Hello,
My name is Lucas and I'd want to present to you fastnote.io. It's still very limited in functionality, but maybe it's good to get feedback earlier (it's already usable, I'm using it daily).
The reason I've created another 'note taking' app is that I couldn't find one that allows me to add notes fast (with minimum effort & time) and that works on any device - both mobile and PC. People like those are my main target: https://www.reddit.com/r/windowsphone/comments/5vqc2y/a_fast_note_app/.
Other major features I want to add: possibility to sync notes between multiple devices, sending note to email, reminders - to make processing notes faster as well.
What do you think about this idea? There's a lot of competition in 'notes taking apps/sites' category, but the audience is very broad as well - is it good idea to go there?
Thanks for feedback!
/Lucas
Hi Lucas,
Congrats on shipping something. I definitely think it's good to get something "into the wild" so you can get feedback early.
I quite often want to capture quick notes. If I can use my hands, I'll use Evernote and tidy it up later by adding tags, putting it in the correct notebook etc. When I can't use my hands (I'm running, driving, in the shower etc.), I use Siri. Although the output is often complete rubbish the fact that I tried to make the note is enough to remind me what I was actually trying to remember.
In terms of your app, I really like the look of it (reminds me of Google Keep). I obviously don't have your passion for the subject (I haven't built an app) but it feels like the notes app market is very crowded. Finding your niche to be able to create a sustainable business is going to be tricky. Perhaps you could help users write their notes quicker by using predefined phrases, shortcuts, emoji or (dare I say it!), predictive AI so the user only has to type a few characters to get a whole sentence. "Fastnote: same note, 20% of the keystrokes. Genius!" :-)
Good luck,
James
A few nitpicks:
-- The text input box should automatically be highlighted, especially since you're going for speed. On desktop it's an extra click (and not super-obvious exactly where I need to click), on mobile it's an extra tap, after which I have to wait for my keyboard to pop up.
-- Doesn't seem like the hamburger menu button is working?
-- The page is crashing every time I load it in Safari (Chrome and Firefox work fine though)
-- Would be cool if clicking on a saved note would automatically copy it to the clipboard
Like others have said, you'll likely have to narrow into a niche in order to monetize. Before narrowing too much though, but after you polish the app a little, see if you can get some legs out of marketing just its "fastness" and see what kinds of users seem most interested. If a certain group of people seem to form around those marketing efforts, it'll eliminate some of the random guesswork.
I'm not in the market, but the market is huge. Lots of room for a niche player who could quickly take the dominant player from behind
Audio notes that are proof-corrected by your personal assistants
Image notes
Pen notes
Simple notes
College notes
Lab notes
Musician notes
Love notes
Where do the notes go? Is this cookie-based, ip-based? Seems like it might be cookie based (could check haha).
I opened up the page on a phone (wrote note in Desktop on same wifi network) phone didn't show note.
Also curious on expiration date. Maybe you could generate unique strings and save them similar to jsfiddle so you don't necessarily need signup, but publicly visible notes could be a problem.