An Update to the World

Hello all! It has been a while since we've been in touch with people who have been testing our app. Our journey has been nothing short of excitement, happiness and passion but sometimes there are factors that are outside of our control that could cause it to end prematurely. Today, TixxMe regretfully announce that we are shelving the idea and will be taking a step back to evaluate other opportunities.

But being entrepreneurs, we don't want our project to disappear into thin air. The least we can do is to tell its story, giving the project its moment of existence in this world.

The Question of Happiness

The story begins...

After going through the summer session in SSE Labs, the Stanford accelerator now named StartX, and having talked to many entrepreneurs around the valley last year, we thought that we had the ability to build something that can actually improve people's lives. Instead of creating another me too product or betting on the so-called trends, we wanted to do something that is meaningful, something that our team would be proud of.

Picking the right idea is not easy. The idea is the seed of the company and you need to have the right ingredients, i.e. a big market, unique value proposition, for it to grow properly. Most importantly, the people nurturing it have to be passionate about their work. So we asked ourselves, what are the things that make us truly happy? Watering my friends' virtual crops isn't it, discovering pretty girls' photos isn't it, watching videos online isn't it.

The truly happy moments are times like going to a concert and humming, singing, clapping to the music with your friends. The music is part of it, yes. But the real reason is because you and your friends are together. You're not lonely.

When we plan our product, there're tons of things to consider: product market fit, user validation, usability and design, launch strategy, single user experience, metrics, monetization strategy... and the list goes on and on. But the more we think about what people really need, the more we realize that most people just want something simple: to be with their friends.

Return to Simplicity

So then we thought, wouldn't it be nice if you could hangout with your friends, in the real world, any time you want? Even better, what if your friends can know when you're free and whether you're nearby, so it takes out the uncertainty of them being busy and the embarrassment of them saying "I'm sorry. I'm busy. Next time". The moments you share the laughter and tears with your friends. The times you look at your friends smiling faces and experience life together. These are what make us truly happy. From that point on, we strived to help you develop more meaningful friendships. We wanted you to spend more time offline with friends.

To achieve that, the application must be simple - there're some apps out there for organizing events but none of them are simple and lightweight enough for spontaneous gatherings. SMS and various messaging products seem to get close, but cold dead lists of messages - even if it's the new fangled "grouped messaging" - don't really relate to happy memories. What we want to see are our friends' faces, both in the real world and online.

Mobile HTML5

For people to get together easily, the product needs to be mobile, and it should be ubiquitous - it should work even if you and your friends are on different mobile phone platforms. We could either write the app natively once on iOS, once on Android and once on Blackberry, or code it in HTML5 once. After weighing the pros and cons, we decided to go the HTML5 route given our limited resources.

Making HTML5 applications work on mobile devices is not an easy feat since it's a rather new technology that remains to be tested and perfected. However, if it could be made to work, the benefits are huge. For example, instead of hiring specialists across different mobile platforms just to design the user interface, you could find one CSS designer to mock it up - and it will work cross platform. Therefore, despite the well-known problems with mobile HTML5, such as performance and debugging, we went ahead and discovered our own ways of making HTML5 work for us. And thankfully, it worked!

We plunged forward and kept refining the technology, pulling all-nighters at times but it was exhilarating. Until four months ago, we decided to release the prototype to members of the StartX community so that we could get some feedback. A dozen of beta versions followed in regular weekly intervals, each coming with significant improvements in features, performance or robustness.

The first beta still felt a lot like the usual jQuery Mobile application - slow, felt like a web page instead of a mobile application, kind of working but not quite there yet. But hard work paid off. A dozen of version increments later, the application became so fast in our iPhone 3GS that it was essentially indistinguishable from native applications. Our own team members and some friends began to use it to plan lunch gatherings. Thanks to the app, we were able to see our friends more often!

Universal Applications

Once we've got the iOS HTML5 application working and the usual performance problems worked out, we looked at our options - we can port this thing to Android, to BlackBerry, to a Chrome Extension, to a Firefox Extension, even to a desktop application, with relatively little effort. This kind of idea, just like any social idea, of course, is not new. Nonetheless, with the little engineering resources we have, it's amazing how we managed to pull this off and our team is proud of that.

Product Insights

The reader might assume that our situation was quite rosy given that some friends were using it and that the technology was working. However, deep down, we knew we didn't really nail the product. We are strong believers in minimalistic design and a lightweight, very focused user experience. But the iteration we had then still felt too heavy and bloated despite our effort in optimizing the flow of event invitation. Friends did use the app to invite folks from time to time but the engagement rate wasn't off the charts. Why did it not feel right? Towards the very end, we finally realized that the model of the organizer actively inviting friends was too much friction for average users. Most of them simply wanted an app that could show them what their friends were interested in doing so that they could join with little effort. Ultimately, the passive consumption model trumped the active invitation approach and it was too late for us to pivot again.

A Temporary Ending

Had the project continued, we should have been at the 15th or 16th beta release now, and the differentiation and usefulness of PingPlans, the tentative product name back then, from the numerous group-messaging products would have become apparent. Our dream of seeing a world filled with meaningful relationships could have come true. Alas, the project has to be paused due to personal issues and we'll have to wait a little longer before our vision materializes.

The product is far from complete - but the technology for us to get there is all there. We are considering releasing the unfinished but working project under the BSD license such that other people passionate in the same cause can carry on the work.

Lastly, we want to thank people who have believed in us, helped us and guided us along the journey. Special thanks to Dave Hodson, who has been a great supporter since our humble beginnings. Aaron Lee, for saving us from multiple crises and for being an invaluable advisor. To our interns, Kenny and Lucas, who were brave enough to join us in our cause. And finally to StartX, for having us and for allowing us to be part of the Stanford entrepreneurial family.

Someday, we will return and we shall be stronger and even more ready to embrace the goal of bringing sustainable happiness to others' lives.

Team TixxMe
8-5-2011

EDIT [2011-8-11]: The source code of PingPlans can now be found in martinkou's bitbucket account.