“We’re building something here, detective. We’re building it from scratch. All the pieces matter.” - Lester Freamon
About a year ago, we realized bookmarking applications are not adapted to the way we currently use the Web. Facebook walls did, over time, set up a standard of how we expect to interact with links. A modern bookmarking application should for example display thumbnail pictures and allow you to open as much content as possible directly within it.
Bookmarking applications are actually so unadapted that most people don’t use them and have to resort to emails, text documents or social networks to save their favorite links. So, about a year ago, we decided to change that.
We had an idea, which we felt was great: creating a truly simple web application that would allow people to collect and share the links that matter to them. How would we achieve that? We had no idea. We were two French gentlemen quite interested in what was being done on the web, but solely on the end-user side.
To reflect our idea we picked the name “Minilogs”. “Mini” would express our commitment to simplicity. “Logs” would be the collections of links users would create through our application. Also, “Blog” is short for “Weblog”, and, as you probably noticed, blogs aren’t that easy to create, so “Minilogs” would be for those who want a personal space to express themselves far from blogs’ complexity.
Lots of research later (thanks r/startups, thanks Quora), we started writing specs and drawing mockups. They sucked at first, but eventually got better as we started figuring out user experience concepts. An “add bar” would always be displayed. It would allow users to create and edit their Logs. Logs could then be accessed in a click through a side panel.
We believe there is a craving for simplicity and better user experience all over the Web and have built Minilogs accordingly. Each task can be achieved with a minimum number of actions. For example, starting a Log only requires two actions: pasting a link in the orange “add bar” and pressing “Enter”.
Six months ago we randomly met Otu (one of those “friend of a friend” kind of deal). He is a great developer who had been touring Europe for quite some time (London, Berlin, Paris). He is now part of the team and is handling the technical side of our project.
We reached a point in our testing where your input is crucial. We want to understand your needs regarding bookmarking and include them as soon as possible in the development process. More than ever, any comment from your side is highly valuable.
We are very proud to present you this first version and hope you enjoy Minilogs as much as we do!
