Mixel, our social collage app for iPad, debuted at around midnight Wednesday, and so I barely got any sleep last night. I spent a long, tiring, exhilarating day today watching new users pour into the network, as well as responding to tweets and emails and generally trying to keep tabs on everything Mixel-related. We got some really terrific, very generous press coverage from lots of different outlets, and I’ll try and gather those in one place soon for those interested.
At about 6:00 I went home, read a few stories to my daughter and gave her a long hug before putting her to bed. Laura and I had a nice dinner together and then we sat down to watch some television. Just before we went to turn on the set we both checked into Mixel — and suddenly it was an hour later.
I’m just stunned and flabbergasted and deeply, deeply humbled by all the activity on Mixel during this, its first day. There was a constant stream of likes, comments, new mixels and remixes flooding in, and it kept me completely transfixed. I should really be sleeping right now, but I couldn’t turn in without acknowledging what this means to me.
Many of you may know that developers cannot freely send out pre-release versions of native iOS apps to alpha and beta testers — Apple imposes distribution limitations — so for the past eight months my co-founder Scott and I have been using Mixel with just a few dozen other (awesome) people. To now see thousands of people join in, many of them doing amazing and beautiful work, and many of them apparently having a great time, is very much like a waking dream for me. In fact, I think I’m avoiding sleep because I’m secretly afraid that will put an end to it.
In short, I’m touched by the enthusiasm and the experimentation and the feedback and even the criticism. We’re very proud of what we built but we’re also very cognizant of the fact that not everything we did was perfect, not by a long shot. There are many things that we did right, many others that we executed in less-than-ideal ways, and even some things that we got just plain wrong, and there’s even an already pretty healthy debate over which ones are which. I’m going to address some of these in the coming days and weeks, and we’re going to fix everything we can as soon as we can — maybe not to everyone’s satisfaction, but we are listening closely to what is being said about Mixel, I can assure you of that.
Right now though I just want to say thank you to everyone who gave even a tiny fraction of their waking hours to Mixel during its debut day. It means a lot to me.
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Congratulations to the whole team. Mixel is a delight. Really excited to see where you take it next.
My only remark is about the FB Connect. As Facebook is blocked in China, or that this app can target kids who are not (yet?) using it.
My kids and I had a lot of fun with Mixel tonight. I can’t wait to see what else we, and other users, do with such a fun piece of software. Thank you!
I love that your enthusiasm is so evident in this post. Mixel is really, deeply great. I look forward to seeing how this platform develops.
Thumbs up! I have had so much fun with Mixel today. It’s a whole bunch of things I didn’t know I was missing. (Un-cropping photos!? Amazing) Thanks for this.
Looks really interesting and useful, but since you need to sign in with Facebook credentials I will never be a user.
Facebook force feed? Facetious faux pas. Farewell!
I think the dream’s just starting, and couldn’t be more proud of you & Scott on an amazing first day. I hope those with requests will see that little things like adding ways to sign in without Facebook are trivial compared to adding passion like what’s evident in this post, and will be patient/thoughtful enough to respond to your obviously positive intentions in kind.
Mixel is off to a great start!
Yes, as long as the dev’s are passionate, would-be users requests for alternate methods to access the app are trivial, aren’t they?
Mixel brings to the masses that best part about Dribbble: rebounding.
The web component for sharing Mixel’s is also very clever. (Even the URLs were thought-out.)
I’m excited to see what features will be added in the future.
I find the app concept intriguing but have two questions about it:
1) What are the copyright infringement implications here?
2) I thought this could really be a fun app for my 10-year-old daughter, but the FB thing makes that impossible. Couldn’t there be a way to turn the social aspect on and off? I know that kills your marketing plan to spread the word virally, but my daughter and her friends could have a hell of a great time taking turns making Mixels. Even her art class at school could have fun with this. The mandatory FB signup makes that impossible.
Khoi & Co….I am finally home, reunited with the iPad and Facebook, and we can’t wait to “PLEASE TOUCH THE ART” ! (That slogan still gives me the chills.) Felicitations from all of us, you can’t imagine the bragging going on on this side of the ocean. xx, Thuy’s Aunt Jenni
What about people who refuse to go on Facebook? Like me: I am an artist who might enjoy Mixel, but am very anti-Facebook, due to privacy concerns, and FB’s dictatorial power throughout the web.