[Lab] Introducing TugBits.com - a marketplace for makers.

Wed Jun 8 15:29:30 EDT 2011

Hi Jean-Marc,

Yes.  A seller can update their sale file for an item and a buyer can
re-download the item.  This works today.

In the future, we will add notification services so that if you buy an item
and it is updated, you will get an email or note next time you log onto the
website.  We also plan on adding traditional social networking features like
"following" a seller to see when they list new items as well as "groups" so
people can find hackerspaces near them and what other locals are up to.

Cheers,
Tom

On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 3:12 PM, Jean-Marc LeBlanc <
jeanmarc.leblanc at gmail.com> wrote:

> Would a buyer be able to download patches or update the software for free?
>
> say I put some source for sale some people buy it later on some one
> finds a major bug and I fix it
>
> Jean-Marc Le Blanc
> ---
>
> "Do you pine for the nice days of Minix-1.1, when men were men and
> wrote their own device drivers?" Linus Torvalds
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 2:38 PM, Tom Burns <tom.i.burns at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi Darcy, thank you for your response!
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 1:53 PM, Darcy Whyte <darcy at siteware.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> The site looks nice.
> >> 25%? You might find that wanting 1/4 of sale amounts will provide
> >> significant friction to adoption (for buyers and sellers).
> >
> > I understand and agree.  Once we are running for awhile we will have some
> > knowledge of our costs and plan on scaling our cut accordingly.  We'd
> rather
> > claim 25% up front and bring it lower in the future than vice-versa and
> be
> > accused of bait & switch.  Out of interest, considering the service
> offered,
> > what would you consider to be a fair percentage?
> >
> >>
> >> It doesn't have any measures for authenticity (ebay has reviews, web
> pages
> >> have in-degree). How can buyers and sellers have as much confidence as
> they
> >> have with ebay without those measures?
> >
> >
> > The state of the site right now is "minimal viable product", so a lot of
> > features are missing but planned.  Buyers will be able to rate items, and
> a
> > seller's rating will be a weighted average of their item's ratings.  As
> of
> > right now a logged-in user can comment on an item which gives a simple
> means
> > to provide feedback, but a lot more is planned.
> >
> >>
> >> If a person were to list a product for sale on their own Web site, why
> >> would your Web site sell more? Especially given that having a Web site
> is
> >> either free or next to nothing and you keep all the revenue.
> >
> >
> > We offer a few benefits compared to doing it yourself:
> > - We are actively marketing this website.  Our success is derived from
> your
> > success, so we are trying hard to drive customers to our site, to buy
> your
> > product.
> > - Marketplace visibility.  You will gain exposure by having your items
> > listed alongside other similar items.
> > - Simplicity.  You want to spend your time designing and building things,
> > not writing PayPal integration code.
> > - Security.  Items purchased with our service are only downloadable by
> the
> > buyer.  The payload content is stored on Amazon's S3 servers and without
> a
> > generated download key, access is denied.
> >
> >>
> >> I clicked through to the "Domain Name Finder" product at your site.
> >> What you've done there is avoided putting the name of the product in the
> >> Title Metatag. You put your own buyline there instead. You also didn't
> put
> >> product name or information in the H1 tag. In fact you have a blank H1
> tag.
> >> With that situation, it reduces the chance that someone can google the
> >> product successfully.
> >
> > Thanks!  That is completely a bug.  I've added it to our immediate TODO
> > list.  We need to fix our SEO, I completely agree.  You should see a fix
> for
> > this in the next 48 hours.
> >>
> >> So what would be the reason someone would list on your site rather than
> >> just make a simple site of their own?
> >
> > The list I provided above enumerates what I see as our advantages.  It's
> a
> > good question!
> > Cheers,
> > Tom
> >
> >>
> >> Darcy
> >>
> >> On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 1:25 PM, Tom Burns <tom.i.burns at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> I'd like to introduce the community to a website I've been working on
> >>> with a few friends.  I would love to hear your feedback on the idea and
> the
> >>> site, http://www.tugbits.com .
> >>> Our dream goal is to help people quit their desk jobs and pay their
> bills
> >>> doing what they love, making things.
> >>> TugBits.com is a digital marketplace for makers.  You upload your
> design
> >>> files, list them for sale, and collect money via PayPal when your item
> >>> sells.  Likewise, you can use the site to find quality, reviewed
> designs
> >>> suitable for printing on your 3d printer, milling on your CNC, running
> on
> >>> your Arduino, etc.  Also suitable would be e-books, schematics, source
> code
> >>> libraries and tools, etc.  Only after the PayPal transaction is the
> buyer
> >>> able to download the files.  There are no physical items sold on the
> TugBits
> >>> store, only files.
> >>> Our goal is to help talented makers easily profit from their hard work.
> >>>  We do not want to replace the existing "free/open source" model, but
> we
> >>> want to augment it. We think that if you can get paid for your work it
> will
> >>> compel you to go the extra step and make it that much better.  Market
> driven
> >>> innovation.
> >>> Registering and listing items is free.  We charge 25% of your gross
> >>> revenue and bill monthly.  Depending on our costs and community
> feedback
> >>> this number is probably going to change, but it's similar to the costs
> >>> associated with putting an app on an app store or a musician listing
> with
> >>> iTunes.
> >>> Currently you can register on the site and list items for sale, which
> is
> >>> what I would love for any of you interested to do.  We are in the final
> >>> stages of getting PayPal to sign off on the site, at which point
> sellers
> >>> will be able to collect money and items will be able to be sold.
> >>> Please visit the site and let me know what you think!  Even if you hate
> >>> it, please reply to tell me why.
> >>> Thank you,
> >>> Tom Burns
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
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> >>> http://artengine.ca/mailman/listinfo/lab
> >>>
> >>
> >
> >
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> >
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