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Launch HN: Stipop (YC S21) – Improving user engagement with stickers

Author: tonyatkc

Score: 27

Comments: 20

Date: 2021-12-02 14:48:26

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eatonphil wrote at 2021-12-02 19:11:24:

Super neat! Years ago after first seeing Kakaotalk I thought about offering the same kind of service. But the service idea also seemed ridiculous to me at the time. I like the way you're doing it!

And I'm not sure why it's taken so long for stickers to come to the US when they've been so popular in Korea at least (dunno if they're as popular in other East Asian countries).

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 01:11:25:

Thanks! And agreed - it did take quite a while to come. iMessage and WhatsApp only added stickers a few years ago and maybe that's why it took a while to get into the hands of the users and pick up the trend. Now we're taking part in that too, so hopefully things accelerate much faster.

tommoor wrote at 2021-12-02 19:08:21:

Hey, looks interesting! What's the business model? I think you might need to be more upfront about that on your site.

nerdponx wrote at 2021-12-02 19:30:45:

> We provide the service for free and plan to turn freemium next year. We monetize by creating custom stickers for brands like Coca-Cola.

Seems reasonable.

But I wonder if there is a way to slide some kind of shady user tracking into this system. Maybe Stipop will figure out how to track end users, and sell that data as an extra revenue stream.

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 01:06:28:

Good point, we can track data like sticker view, send, download etc. which we can use to analyze character ranking by user locale information.

nerdponx wrote at 2021-12-03 03:25:43:

I hope it was clear from the tone of my post that I think that tracking individual user behavior (as opposed to tracking aggregate statistics) is a _bad_ outcome, at least for end users.

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 05:33:10:

The data we collect are real basic, like views, subscriptions, comments sort of data that for example YouTube collects. And device language of course, to provide the stickers in correct language. This also helps us suggest better stickers for the end users. Can you help me understand how it can be a bad outcome for the end users?

nerdponx wrote at 2021-12-03 08:50:16:

Whenever individual-level user data becomes a revenue source, it sets up a lot of incentives for organizations to disregard privacy and security concerns around users' personal data, which is often trivial to de-anonymize even if it has no "PII" attached to it. Sharing that individual-level data with advertisers subjects users to immoral surveillance.

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-06 02:33:23:

Yes indeed, thank you for the note. I totally agree. We should be very careful when it comes to user data. We won't be selling or sharing user data - instead we'll find ways to see insightful information from bulk data, like total sticker send, download etc.

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 01:03:59:

Yes true, some of the clients have been asking about pricing as well and so we are adding a pricing page. Other than brand stickers we plan to add premium options like seasonal stickers, personal curation, premium content, and so on.

motoxpro wrote at 2021-12-02 19:24:12:

"We provide the service for free and plan to turn freemium next year. We monetize by creating custom stickers for brands like Coca-Cola."

politician wrote at 2021-12-02 16:04:30:

Tangentially related: does anyone know of a vendor offering YouTube-style comments and live/super chat as a service?

skrebbel wrote at 2021-12-03 08:10:33:

Check out TalkJS:

https://talkjs.com

Disclosure: I'm one of the founders. Compared to alternatives, our main differentiator is pre-built chat UIs (that are still deeply customizable) and a fully integrated notification system.

We don't have an out-of-the-box Stipop integration (yet?), though, but it looks like a pretty cool service to integrate.

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 09:20:09:

Hey, yes I've actually spoken with one of your co-founders just a few days ago and he said he'll be chatting with the product team too. We should look into it!

skrebbel wrote at 2021-12-03 14:52:30:

Ah cool!

icy wrote at 2021-12-02 16:41:42:

CometChat comes to mind.

https://cometchat.com

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-02 17:05:29:

Oh yes, and there's Stipop docs on CometChat too.

https://www.cometchat.com/docs/extensions/stickers-stipop

politician wrote at 2021-12-02 17:31:14:

Thank you!

option_greek wrote at 2021-12-02 17:35:21:

Any open source options similar to comet chat (but obviously may be with less functionality) ?

tonyatkc wrote at 2021-12-03 01:08:17:

Here are some I know: Sendbird, PubNub, MirrorFly, Mesibo - this might be a good one to try if your looking for something simple and completely open source.