My startup lasted one day... I need your insights!
Yesterday I launched slackbucket.com, a daily backup service for Slack. I was excited because it's a very simple idea and it took me only a few hours since I built it as lean as possible.
I read all the TOS and didn't find anything that could be potentially against me. My thought was: Slack already provide the ability for users to back up their data, even for non-paid users. Is it legal if someone wants to back up his/her data and save on GoogleDrive or Dropbox? I don't think so. And SlackBucket would only automate this analog process.
But then someone dropped me a message with this snippet:
Business: In using Slack APIs, developers must agree to respect our business as we respect yours. Every Application must behave in accordance with appropriate and accepted business conduct. As part of good business practices, Applications and developers are prohibited from:
*Circumventing Slack’s intended limitations (including pricing, features and access structures). You may not use the Slack API to replicate or compete with core products or services offered by Slack
BOOOOM... My startup just exploded away.
What should I do? Does anyone can think in a way to work around this limitation?
Thanks in advance for any insight.
With all due respect, your service is clearly just a way for users to circumvent having a paid Slack plan. Why would they allow that to continue? I'd argue the lifting of the 10k message limit is one of the most compelling reasons for people to upgrade.
On to the next idea!
Have a "full history" definitely is not the only thing you get for the paid plan. Video calls, improved private chats, documents, guest-users, etc, etc, etc.
But I agree that it's one of the most compelling reasons for people to upgrade.
I mean it looks pretty cut and dry to me. When running an application on top of another product, you are at their whim. Platforms like Slack expect to form a symbiotic relationship with the developer ecosystem.
Is there anyway you can pivot to something that doesn't directly compete with Slack?
I'm not actually competing with Slack. This is just an add-on for their service.
Imagine a community with thousands of users. A lot of valuable happen every day, and everything is lost forever because of such limit. Store the backup somewhere is the only way to keep those valuable discussions...
But Slack delivers way more than chat history...
you ARE competing with their pricing structure. Since you're giving people access to more than 10k messages or whatever, they don't HAVE to upgrade. so you're competing.
This copy is from your home page. To me it is obvious that you are competing with Slack. You are giving uses a way to avoid paying for a premium Slack feature.
Yeah, I agree. But as I wrote earlier, "full history" is not the only thing you get by upgrading to a paid plan. Saying that this is the only thing you take is to diminish the value they add to you.
But I agree this is a compelling reason to upgrade.
Honestly, i don't think your issue is your product, its your domain name :)
They likely will not approve of using 'slack' in the domain name for IP/branding reasons.
Regarding the product, I don't see an issue with it. You are providing an external backup solution outside of the slack environment. That is not the same as what they offer on paid plans (the ability to access your history within slack). Its more of knowing that if slack servers were to crash and they lost their data, you have it backed up on your servers.
I would advertise it as a peace of mind solution for slack users (regardless of which tier they are on).
Lol, you are right about the domain. To be honest I thought this would be the only issue for this idea. But I took the risk during the validation phase. If anything I can just change the name and the domain.
Your thoughts are exactly the same as mine. The ability to back up the data is given by Slack. I’m just providing a hosting solution for it.
Maybe I should adjust the pitch and avoid mention or compare the costs.
Thanks for your feedbacks! This community is great :)
Can you get an idea out of what you just built?
Like....
Read the messages and use sentiment analysis to display a company/department/team/individual overall quality / communication health. Use "machine learning" (and blockchain!! kidding) to identify groups that work well together, individuals who are on their way out, etc.
Make it a weekend project.
I got your idea. Although I don't like much about manipulate user's data, it's a good product idea indeed. I'll talk with the potential customers to see what they think about it.
Thanks for your comment! ;)
This wasn’t a “startup” at all. You not only tried to steal Slack’s main source of revenue, but you also stole their logo. Not a good idea.
The title is a click bait. It's a side project, a venture... an adventure :P
The name and logo are only during the validation period. I already planned to change both once I got the results of the first iteration.
Thanks for your constructive comment.
I think you should ask them if they're OK with your product.
Why? Because their legal team can contact you anytime. Example: https://medium.com/@X3I/rebranding-slackemoji-com-27010a7d5535
You are right. I'll contact them. Thanks :)
I would suggest that you take the product offline. Allow users to download their messages into your app on their desktop/device.
Due to privacy laws, all content shared by a user is theirs and Slack cannot deny a user to backup and store their own data. If they did, it would create a legal issue that no one wants to deal with at this stage of the game.
So as long as users can download content from Slack (I'm not sure if they can, because I haven't tried it). Then they can store it on your backup - and you can fill out the data onto a Slack - Like Dashboard, that users can organize on their own, offline. You could even have an export version that allows users to add that data back to their slack channel in a later date or even a send option to send messages between your backups on different users' desktops.
I think this could be of value for some people, but likely others will keep to the current structure of just paying Slack for their services of holding onto their messages for longer (more convenient for users), while your method is likely more private and controllable by users.
So think:
Import / Export / Share / Store / File Slack content (and any other online content as you should diversify to other platform data as well).
Make it offline may be a good option. Thanks for your suggestion.
You’re welcome!
Hey,
First thing I'd like to say is that the landing page for your product is ace! I like the name and the concept.
It does seem to me that you are competing with Slack and it looks like you are circumventing a workflow they have built into their product so that can make money.
Think about it this way. If you rented a house and then you rented said house out to your friend for money. That is not in good faith. The landlord would be ticked off. Slack is the landlord here and they can dictate the service and terms as they please.
Is there a way to turn this around? I think you are close but you need a few more iterations. Keep at it.
You should probably look at the value proposition canvas again...and again before pushing another line of code :)
Lastly, well done for trying and failing. Hopefully you can find positives from this.
Thanks for such a constructive feedback :)
But think about it... You are the owner of your data. And Slack knows, this is why they allow you to backup. Let's think in some approaches...
What if you go everyday, manually download your data and save in your computer?
What if instead you pay your nephew to do the same task manually?
What if you download manually and import in a tool that will help you visualize your data (since JSON files are not human-readable)?
What if you pay for a friend to build a system that will automate this task (backup, store and display)?
Is any of the above scenarios ilegal?
Look, I'm not here to be right. I'm asking for the help of this awesome community. I'm just trying to find a way to workaround this limitation.
Thanks again for your comment.
You're welcome.
"Is it legal if someone wants to back up his/her data and save on GoogleDrive or Dropbox?" No, I think you're right.
The issue slack has is that you're a middleman coming in.
As per the other comments, best idea is to take it offline. Is there a slack plugin or "backup-bot" to prompt the user to download their data to the desktop?
If not, maybe you could do that first and then have the separated slackbucket ready to sync to the user's local folder (slack-backup-bot-foler) on their laptop. Then Slack cannot interfere or block you - at least on first impression.
The key thing appears to be is that your tool could be viable if users can work with it offline.
Keep testing in increments.
Yeah, I think I have a few approaches to validate:
Take it down and go for another idea
Try to get approval from Slack
Build it as an offline tool
Make it free and open source
Offer as a self-hosted software with support
The last one seems a very interesting model. It was suggested by someone that hanged in the live chat at the website. He told me this is a great tool for them and they need this, but unless they can take control of their data he wouldn’t use.
I’ll try to validate and decide which direction to follow.
what if you pivot it to HipChat & other discussion services instead of Slack and start there? : p. still a pretty sizable market I assume
This is a good idea
HipChat (and Atlassian's replacement product, Stride) are due to be decommissioned in February 2019. Atlassian have partnered with Slack and will be focusing on integration rather than their own product.
They must have a similar clause on their ToS :/
But indeed this is a pretty sizable market :)
When you are creating a startup and you rely completely on another party, the best thing to do initially is contact them to see whether they are okay with it. Having an initial contact sets up a relation you can fall back on in case your service is performing badly due to them. It also helps validate that you are allowed to run that service and to hear whether they have something in the pipeline that will void your idea one month away.
In terms of legal advice. You cannot take any recommendation here seriously, the best thing to do is to get legal advice. However, out of experience I can tell you that the company can validly demand a cease and desist based on your service competing with their own backup services. They can legally revoke your API use.
And if you believe you have any legal right to the API, you are wrong. Services like these can revoke access based of over usage alone, so a breach to the actual terms of reason enough for closing you down.
The best thing you can do now is reach out to them and explain you were unaware about these terms, you're still hoping to be able to move forward but you will only do so with their approval. Try to be respectful and kind and maybe you still have a shot at this. Once they do approve your service, make sure you get this written down aka signed and sealed..
Yeah, you are right. I was afraid to contact them, but I think this is the only way if I want to run this way.
Thanks for your feedback!
Adding to this, they have an app directory and it mentions a backup addon. TL:DR slack allows such services, get in touch with them and try to get approval.
rel: https://opencollective.slack.com/apps/A1R9DMFS7-backupery-for-slack
From Slack's point of view, they want users upgrading to their paid version to get backup feature. So to them, this is taking away their business I am guessing.
I think that if it's available through API it might not be illegal. Have you ever emailed them to check it?
Legality isn't the issue but breaking the ToS. Slack would be in their right to block the IP of any service/application that violates their ToS.
No, I haven't. I'm not sure if I should :P