swytch.net - my attempt at a social network
I've just launched swytch.net, a little social network I've been working on for a month or so. It's nowhere near ready for public consumption but the core ideas are there and I'd be interested to hear what others think. Here are some of the things that I think differentiate it from facebook and co: 1) multiple profiles: having one set of "friends" from all your different social circles limits you to sharing only what you're willing to share with the entire group. On swytch, a user can have a separate, distinct profile for each social circle. 2) robust privacy: each profile is either public…
What it does
In the maker’s words, at launch
I've just launched swytch.net, a little social network I've been working on for a month or so. It's nowhere near ready for public consumption but the core ideas are there and I'd be interested to hear what others think. Here are some of the things that I think differentiate it from facebook and co: 1) multiple profiles: having one set of "friends" from all your different social circles limits you to sharing only what you're willing to share with the entire group. On swytch, a user can have a separate, distinct profile for each social circle. 2) robust privacy: each profile is either public or private. Content is either open to anyone or restricted to your followers. There is no third tier - you don't have to worry about friends of friends accessing your data. Social networks need stronger, simpler privacy - not more privacy controls. 3) private by default. I think the perception that users don't care about privacy is way off the mark. Users don't always know about privacy settings and their implications but that's not the same as not caring. On swytch, everything is private by default. On private profiles, nothing but the username is revealed to non-followers. 4) location: sites like foursquare and gowalla offer this but they're too gimmicky. I think they have to be because their entire service is based around location, they have little else to offer. However, location data combined with updates, photos events etc is very useful. Please kick the tyres and tell me what you think. There is no landing page yet but you can sign up here (only a un & pw are required): http://www.swytch.net/sign_up
Does the same job
all alternatives →- SDSocialFolders, "Dropbox for social"2012 · ▲187
Hey fellow HN-ers, I'd like to ask HN about my latest startup: SocialFolders. We take a Dropbox-like approach to managing your content on your social networks by mirroring all the content you have on these networks in folders on your computer. Moving this content around, between folders or between services, is mirrored in the all-mighty "cloud" (ugh, I hate this word). We'd love to know what you think. We think our approach solves the problem of managing content at scale. We put together a quick 2'30 screencast to show HN how it works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4s2TFsVezZQ If you want…
- SSSWYM - Share what you make2012 · ▲50
Hi guys, I launched a two-day app at a Hacker News London meetup last year. It's called SWYM: Share What You Make. Check it out here - http://swym.me The idea is simple and in a way inspired from Show HN posts. Every time someone posts something cool here, someone asks how did you make it? So Swym provides a simple way to share the tools and people you built your projects with. I put it on the shelf after presenting it last year, but it's one of those things that kept coming back at me. So, I decided to bring it back to life. Here's the full back story - http://swym.me/story If there's…
- MSMini social network that I made as my first MERN stack project2020 · github.com · ▲64
- AMA minimalist, no-clout social network with chronological feedOct 2025 · ▲5
TLDR: I built a "quick and dirty " private social network for my friends, posted on Reddit and HN, got some interest so now have built it properly along with my brother. site link: https://intimost.com/login/ demo creds: [email protected] Demo123! Full version: I needed a social network where I can just send updates and nothing else. So I built it, my friends liked and now I have built it "for the world". Everything is private by default. - Text-only updates - No likes. Only views to acknowledge a post - [in development] Comments are private between the poster and…
- SNSocial network where anyone can be seen (Quickpost)2025 · qqpost.netlify.app · ▲5
Hi HN, I’ve been building a small social network where the feed is always chronological — newest posts come first, always. It’s not 100% algorithm-free (there’s still basic filtering to avoid spam or abuse), but the core idea is that every user has a real chance to be seen, even with zero followers. It’s lightweight, works well on mobile, and supports both posts and comments. Most of the content is currently in Portuguese, since it started with a Brazilian audience, but the interface is mostly language-neutral. I’d love any feedback on the concept, UX, performance, or anything else. Thanks!
- HAHackerLunch - a new way meet hackers2010 · ▲9
Hello HN! Here's my November Startup Sprint project (coded in two days). http://hackerlunch.com It allows you to post your lunch plans and lets other hackers join you. I built this because I often see HN users are interested in meeting each other if they are in the same area. I am not a coder, so this version is very rough. If people use it, I will work with others to build a more polished version. I would love some feedback. What do you think? Is this something you will be using?
More life & fun this month
the category →- TL
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Launched alongside, August 2010
the whole month →- ML
Life & fun · 2010 · zetamac.com
- AN
Hi guys, yesterday I launched a new book notification service called 'Any new books?': http://anynewbooks.com The idea is that you enter your email, subscribe to a few categories of your interest, and then you'll receive one weekly email per category with a list of new interesting books that were just released. The first day was pretty good I think, with many people signing up. Among these, I've already spotted a few key players in our industry (which I take to be a positive sign, of course) and the feedback I've been receiving by email has been very positive so far. I'm posting this here…
Life & fun · 2010
- PT
Someone suggested the Pomodoro-technique on HN and I quickly threw together this page that is supposed to help me try Pomodoro out today. Join my effort today and let me know if you like it!
Life & fun · 2010 · musetheory.de
- V4
Hey guys, Just finished up hacking on my submission for the Wufoo API contest. VoiceForms 4000 takes any existing Wufoo form and turns it into a phone survey. The app is written in Python, runs on App Engine, and uses Twilio for all the phone magic. https://voiceforms4000.appspot.com/ Go ahead and fill one of the sample forms and tell me what you think. Enjoy.
Dev tools · 2010
- IT
Last week I showed prldr.com, a small project I created during my weekends. The immediate thing I learned from the comments was that prldr had to be a RSS reader, which I already had in mind. So after another couple of days programming prldr.com is now a visual rss reader. You read the news by just opening the links from the RSS feeds, simple as that. features for now: management of feeds, import OPML file, keyboard navigation, automatic feed fetching. ps: I disabled preloading of tabs, because some browsers tend to crash when opening 30 iframes :P. Have to implement some stack mechanism to…
Work · 2010
- MS
Life & fun · 2010 · like.fm