Hi everyone, as the title indicates this post is all about co-creating a tech product directly with a community and the various positive effects it has on a project.
Quick background information: about two years ago a friend and me had some mad hung over philosophical discussion about how to make social media communication more personal and more responsible. What we came up with was as simple as in concept as difficult to realise - turn all comments into spontaneous recorded video-comments. All of them!
Over the last two years two other friends joined on this slightly naive quest of building a video-only social network from scratch. As many projects, also this one had many ups and downs while we somehow kept on going. We always felt that there was some magic in the concept to be unlocked, but we always had the feeling of just scratching on the surface....
Just until we decided to completely open it up to everyone who was interested in it and deciding to let the community become a direct part of the building process. This happened around 4 weeks ago and the invigorating effect it had on nearly all aspect of the project is hard to put in words.
This is our first attempt to share the effects of letting the community to be part of something even before it exists.
Effect 1: Confirmation
Being something as a young "founder" or an "entrepreneur" you're constantly pitching your idea to everyone in order to convince people of your vision. Obviously those are the ones you build your product for, potential investors, project partners, but also friends and family - which is probably one of the hardest factors as they usually heard about the project from the beginning. The amount of energy of keeping on convincing them that you are building something with potential and that people want is something that should not be underestimated.
Suddenly having people from all over the world joining in your project, getting excited about it, inviting friends in and even writing blog posts about it is simply incredible. It is this kind of confirmation that everybody needs from time to time on order to give the 120% needed for creating something completely new from scratch - walking the famous extra mile.
** Effect 2: New Ideas and Information**
To everyone working on open-source projects this must be pretty familiar. As a team constantly working on something behind the curtains it happens quickly that you get lost in the operation mode of executing all the things that have to be done. It happens quickly to narrow the field of vision and think in ways that slowly established themselves over the time of the project.
Suddenly having new people coming in, seeing it from the first time is an incredible opportunity to develop completely new ideas or reinvent ideas that were initially discarded. This comes particularly interesting when it is suddenly not you and new community members exchanging thoughts, but even community members among each other.
Watching this can be fascinating - and it reminded us again that some of the biggest inventions, such as the light bulb, where initially discussed in tea houses where people with different mind sets and backgrounds got connected and exchanged thoughts.
Also people have made different experiences with the vast amount of mobile applications out there. Now and from back in the days...quick example: "Guys, did you know that Seesmic tried to build a video-only social network already in the 2000's?"
Effect 3: Support
When creating a startup you quickly come to the point where you're confronted with tasks that you have never done before. In those situations usually the following question arises - do I pay an expert or do I teach it SOMEHOW myself. Due to the fact that you're constantly broke the latter option is usually the one which is taken. So learning becomes a constant aspect of your journey. But sometimes it is simply impossible to reach the level needed to do something good.
Having suddenly people with all kinds of skillsets joining a community, offering help and taking over tasks is a relief that can barely put in words. Having people creating articles for us, helping out with a social media strategy or supporting in design (an area which we specifically suck in...) is priceless. We are humbled by the support we receive.
Effect 4: Fun
This is probably one of the most underestimated factors in building a startup. Suddenly exchanging thoughts and joking around with a bunch of open minded individuals from different places is simply a lot of fun! Especially with the video-reaction technology that we are building it is a captivating experience of joking around with people, seeing their faces and emotions and getting to know them although we have never physically met before.
We are sure that we are only scratching on the surface of the benefits of co-creating something with a community. What are your thoughts about it??
At this point it is a time for a massive THANK YOU to everybody who is supporting us up to this moment!
And not to YOU, if you kept on reading until now
In this post about co-creation there would be something missing without a warm invite to you steemians to join our mission of creating a more personal and responsible communication online.
What we build is a software to record time-stamped video-comments directly on top of any kind of video.
Have a look at our Discord server here. Every idea can have direct impact: https://discord.gg/dYa5nAN