Roast Number One. A visual Q&A App

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questionsandanswers

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Hi!

I am Flo, I'm 19, and I am the founder of Huuno.

Huuno is a visual Q&A App that is born out of the problem that image recognition technology isn't good enough, and there aren't many services available that can accurately identify objects within images.

Huuno relies on the power of the human brain. Instead of directing visual queries to AI, we direct them to other human beings who can answer your questions for you. (What tree is this? What rims are on this car? Is this snake male or female?)

I am aware of the other services out there that offer a similar service (Jelly, Aardvark). So to differentiate ourselves, we are taking a Quora-esque approach to building a community of subject experts who answer your questions. To prevent Huuno from turning into a yahoo answers style wasteland, we are going to invite subject experts to compete for rank as they answer questions, as well as challenging ordinary users to test their knowledge in their chosen subject.

For example, Barry (fictional) - Chairmain of the London British Classics association may spend his spare time answering question on classic Jags, Bentleys, Astons and Roll's Royce's, providing high quality answers to the community while competing against Norman (fictional) - a collector of British Classics - for the top spot in that specific community.

Just a little bit of background, I raised money on Kickstarter to build a little prototype of this app which can be found on www.huuno.org . This allowed me to find a team of 4 guys here in London and the app is now in development!

Let the roasting begin. I am ready :)
 
@questionsandanswers It's great that you provided a gigantic description of what you do here because that mini-app you have on your website is borderline unusable and I have no clue what it is you're doing, nor am I inclined to by checking the website.

I've seen 20 start-ups in 2015 only claiming to "revolutionize visual search". Ultimately they all end up being layers on top of known APIs like camfind, mturk and whatever. They all get stuck with the same problem which is "oh we just need users (on both sides)". Great.

All I'm seeing is a concept that couldn't have taken up more than a few hours to build.

The only reason Quora is so popular is because it's full of narcissistic people who want to promote themselves and shove whatever start-up they're working on down your throat. If you can get that going with huuno, you might have a shot.

I should open an office in London if 616 pounds allows me to hire 4 people there.
 
@moonstar2024 Hey!

Yeah, I keep having issues with the website.. urgh. Will continue working on it & let you know when it is a little more usable.

Of course that is an issue, at the end of the day its user generated content, and without people on both sides of the table, the app is a hollow graveyard of nothingness. Chicken and egg issue aswell.

Please do not think 616gbp will allow you to open an office and hire 4 people haha! Quite the opposite. I think I mentioned in my post that I received further funding after raising money on Kickstarter :)

EDIT -

I did not mention that I received further investment after my kickstarter. Sorry! You were right to assume I am silly
 
@questionsandanswers How do you plan to monetise? Are people going to pay to have their objects identified? I like the novel idea but I'm not sure I can clearly see the path whereby this app turns into a business.
 
@questionsandanswers I don't think this is actually solving a problem.

the problem that image recognition technology isn't good enough, and there aren't many services available that can accurately identify objects within images
Click to expand...

That isn't really a problem. That's like saying "the problem is that nothing can do this" but later saying "but there are similar services that do this" when mentioning Jelly and Aardvark.

Put the problem in human terms. Who is the typical user? What is the average use case? How does it make their life significantly better?
 
@doone What I meant by 'the problem is that nothing can do this' is that there aren't any services that offer image recognition powered simply by tech. There are a few services who offer image recognition powered by humans - like me.

Typical user - there are two sides.

Person A - my dad & my little brother (5 years old). They often take walks through Central Park, and my little brother will pick up every single leaf, bug, twig, and flower he can find. He will ask my dad 'what is this' and my Dad, not having a clue, will have to disappoint him. What he could do, is take a picture of the object, post it to Huuno, and connect with person B.

Person B - This is Mary, a Park Ranger & Biology student in Colorado. She knows everything there is to know about flowers, tree's, bugs, etc. She might see my Dad's picture & give him an answer, simply because it is a subject she enjoys talking about and would love to share her knowledge.

How does this make their lives significantly better? For my Dad, he can answer my little brothers question without having to plow through tons of information online. For my little brother, he now knows what this bug is, and will tell all of his friends at school. For Mary, she feels happy that she helped someone out, and is contributing to a community of knowledge.

Hope that helps!
 
@abraham1972 This is being worked on, but I will put some of my assumptions and possible scenarios down for you.

Incentive number 1 - you, s4hockey4, know a shitload about Hockey. (Assumption.) You know about all the different brand of skates, pads, sticks, etc. So as you answer visual queries about this subject, a big hockey brand, or hockey team might contact you and say 'Hey! Thanks for spreading the word about our brand. Here's 50% off.'

Assumption number 1 - Ranks. As you answer questions, you gain rank within the app. And although this may have no real life benefits, some people just enjoy being crowned an expert in a subject they are passionate about.

Incentive Number 2 - Competitions. Nike launches a competition on Huuno. For the next 1 month, the person who answers the most questions about Nike Shoes gets sent a big prize (personalised shoes, tickets, etc etc)
 
@questionsandanswers Incentive 1 requires a certain cache in reputation that most social media users will not attain, so it's not something I would bank on.

Ranks and other gamification gimmicks are solid but assumes that they are already converted. So, goos, but not enough.

Incentive 2 is a long shot at best. That assumes you ALREADY have a decent user base.

The primary missing component is the crowd draw in the first place. Some brainstorming ideas...
  1. Find people who just love to hear themselves talk. Go to r/askreddit and ask for experts to come and be experts. Going after their vanity just might be your best bet.
  2. Focus on events that have bunch of questions and hold out prizes for people who participate.
 
@sanguinecross Great feedback.

People's vanity is something I am banking on hugely. Some people love to share their knowledge, and dedicate hours and hours to doing so - without any tangible reward.

That's why Quora has been such an interesting and useful case study for me - the content on there is of such an incredibly high standard and it comes simply from smart human beings sharing their knowledge on topics they care about.
 
@questionsandanswers So the question is, how did Quora pick up their user bases? What did they do to convert users? Where did their marketing spend go to do just that?

Don't feel bad if you don't have the answers right now. This is generally the hardest part of any startup. But it is a topic that you need to tackle and figure out pretty quickly.
 
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