A total overhaul of the TORF design is coming. All original TORF members will get a special badge to thank you for participating in my crummy little web site. Friends is up and running. It needs a few tweaks, and I'll get to them in the coming days (the reason I haven't put an announcement at the top of the page is because I want to iron out the kinks before I let everyone know, thankfully, nobody reads the blog). Anyway, you're welcome to invite friends to participate right now (I'm 90% sure it works). Inviting someone as your friend allows you to see each other's votes when you click [more].

On another note, Edna Jester was arrested (handcuffed and put in a car) for refusing to return a neighborhood kids ball. I find this absurd. This is so common that it's a stereotype and all seniors should be given a free pass for keeping neighborhood kids balls. If you agree with me or not, vote here.

Meanwhile, if you have any suggestions or feedback, please send me an email at kapauldo AT (thriveorfail)

The Coupon Lady was violently displaced by Sarah Palin. So much to talk about. I am working on a few cool things and will fill you in shortly. Meanwhile, any suggestions or feedback, drop me a line at kapauldo AT thriveorfail DOT com, or leave a comment in the post, or click on the feedback tab, or send me a tweet on twitter @kapauldo.

The coupon lady is on the verge of becoming the most voted story ever (1 vote away). And it's a blowout, she's a hero. I have spent the past few nights working out the math and the Leader Board now has two new lists- Most Disputed, and Landslides. These are the stories that are really close and really one-sided. You'll need to create an account to use the Leader Board (to keep some sense of privacy for member's votes, I guess). Leave me feedback in the comments if you like this or if you think I should tweak the algorithm a bit (or send me a message at kapauldo AT thriveorfail DOT com.


The next things I have on tap for TORF are poking (nudging someone to respond to your comment, which will appear in MyThrive), OpenID, which will let more users log in without having to sign up, and 'Nemesis and Clone' which will show you which users are most like you and most different from you in voting (all voting will be kept secret). After that, I'm going to add some kind of social function, like groups or friends. I'd love to hear any ideas you may have, either in the comments of this post, or again by e-mail.


Thanks for voting, and remember, tell a friend about TORF, it's more fun when lots of people vote.

Kevin (follow me on Twitter @kapauldo)

Open comments are now up. We'll see how it goes. I'm 90% confident that they'll work. Please let me know if there are any hiccups by dropping me an e-mail at kapauldo AT thriveorfail DOT com.

Thanks,

Kevin

I just finished implementing open comments (UPDATE - I had to abort this b/c it just didn't work and I was too tired to go any further, will update later). You might guess that there's a lot of abuse in the torf voting process, but, amazingly, it's not so bad. There have been a total of 2 stories where people have attempted to cheat the open voting system (open, meaning you don't have to have an account, which, for some reason thousands of people are opposed to). Both stories, I am pretty sure, have been corrupted by the people about whom the submitter wrote or linked.

So, this is good. It confirms 2 hunches about human nature that I have. 1) People are basically good and 2) that business interests make people do what they ordinarily wouldn't do (remember that quote from Wall Street (the movie) where the old guy says to the young guy something close to this - something about the abyss).

In any event, I forgive the cheaters so far. I understand the pressure you're under and I get the desperation when people vote "Fail" for an idea that you've invested so much into. My advice to you is, a) prove us all wrong, and b) forgive us too, because we're just giving you our reflex reactions, you're much smarter than us in this domain and c) don't cheat, it demeans all of us.

Well, after a long night, that's it for me. Send me email at kapauldo AT thriveorfail DOT com, or follow me on Twitter @kapauldo.

Kevin

What a funny juxtaposition today. I think that votes get meaningful when we hit 10 or so. Both stories are up over 15 so I think there's some good entertainment here. I'm just chuckling to myself that Cuil gets a fail, while Whitney gets a thrive??

Kevin

Follow me on twitter @kapauldo

Working on the following changes this morning. Send me email at kapauldo at thriveorfail dot com with any feedback or use the feedback tab:

- opening up comments to non-users (people don't want to register, I get it)
- opening up blog comments to non-users (to make feedback easier)
- adding 'next most popular story' to each story detail to try to get more voting

That's it for now. Let me know what you think.

Kevin

The first validation of ThriveOrFail has arrived. On Saturday, I posted a link to a story from TechCrunch that reported Google walking away from a $200M acquisition of Digg. They apparently walked during due diligence, after a terms sheet was offered. For the uninitiated, the way it works is (someone correct me in the comments if I'm off) Google takes a quick look at your company, does some number crunching, makes you an offer (term sheet), does due diligence (checks the books, contracts, etc.), then closes the deal.

What's amazing is, Thrive voters voted 2-1, that they weren't surprised that Google walked. 56 votes in about 36 hours is pretty significant because it tells you that people have opinions about this issue. That they were largely negative of Digg is telling.

Anyway, thanks for participating, I look forward to the next big turnout.

Kevin

Today is turning out to be a great day for torf (thrive or fail). Lots of votes, a few accounts. Help me understand the reluctance to create accounts by sending me feedback (click the feedback tab) or adding a comment here. Is the site too cheap looking? Just don't like giving your e-mail address? I'm new to this, so nothing is obvious. I appreciate any input you have.

Keep voting! Interesting trends today.

Kevin

Welcome to ThriveorFail. I first kicked around the idea for this website early in the year. I was driving along, listening to a podcast and I was sitting there shaking my head, asking myself, "who funds these startups?" Then I got thinking, wouldn't it be neat if there were some forum where people could have a quick read about a company and then vote on its outcome?

The more I thought about it, the more I thought, it would be even neater if you could vote on people, or whether something was a good idea or not.

One of the reasons I don't like Digg other than a novelty is there are no dimensions to the voting. "Digging" something just means you 'like' something. I thought it would be more interesting to see people take sides and debate.

So anyway, the site is in debug mode right now, so please play around with it, post stories, share it with your friends. I'd appreciate any feedback you have regarding design, vote types, suggestions, anything at all. Either leave me feedback on the 'feedback' tab, or just drop me an e-mail directly at kapauldo AT thriveorfail.com.

Thanks for trying it out!

Kevin Kapauldo