1. We’re back

    January 24, 2012 by bealers

    As you can quickly tell from the blog’s history we got ever so close to finishing, then it all went quiet.

    Why? 2 main reasons:

    • The main developer (me) upped sticks and started moving around the country looking for a place to call home;
    • The holes started appearing in sw0p’s model;
    Either way, sw0p got shelved.

    But here we are over 5 years since the initial idea and 3 years since we started development and *still* there’s no decent online tool to barter items and skills. So, we’re determined to finish it off this time.

    The last few weeks have been spent dusting off the code and checking it all. The good news is that we really did got lots done. We’ve also got new ideas on how to plug the holes in the model to make it a genuinely useful and, more importantly, a very usable product.

    The main changes are:

    • After careful consideration we’ve decided to introduce a virtual currency to sw0p. People will assign a value to their items or skills which can then be traded against. The important change is that users will be able to ‘purchase’ an item even if they don’t have anything relevant to trade at that moment. As an added bonus the currency we’re using, Bitcoin, is well established and can be used externally to sw0p;
    • Remove the concept of ‘wanted’ items. Users will now search or browse for stuff that they want and then offer their own listings or virtual money in return;
    • We’re introducing a lending concept to items so you can keep track of who has your stuff;
    • Easy registration using Twitter/Facebook OAuth-alike logins.
    • sw0p really needs API so motivated third parties can develop useful add-ons. This may not be ready for initial launch but it’s high on the feature list;

    So, there you have it. We’re cutting code again and looking to get something out for testing Q2 or Q3 this year.

    We’ve got everything covered technically so will be launching with or without external help. That said we could really do with some help in other key areas, namely:

    • Marketing & PR: Do you have any good ideas on how we could get the concept out there when we do launch?
    • Legal: We’re need advice and decent Ts&Cs drawn up around tracing contracts as well as contracts drawing up for the charity/co-op/CiC that we eventually transfer ownership of the product over to;
    • Mobile: A native app for iPhone and Android could really accelerate uptake;
    • Moral support: No particular skills to offer? Good at making tea? Maybe we should talk anyway.
    • Donate: Please feel free to send Bitcoins to us, any money will be spent directly on development and hosting. Our address is 14QUKGqMEKQp9BFfjz2xftwxsvfyeyKFwa

    We’re already digging deep financially to deliver what we’ve promised so there’s not much budget left for the above. However, if it makes a difference to you we’re open to ideas on the commercial structure for sw0p, including setting the business up as a not-for-profit.

    If you’ve more questions please check the FAQ and also feel free to get in touch by email. You can also get me directly on twitter and we can go from there.

     

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  2. It’s me. And I’m excited.

    February 3, 2009 by mike

    I’d like to introduce myself.

    My name is Mike Ellis. I live in Bath, and I work on the web as a “Solutions Architect” for a company called Eduserv.

    When people ask me exactly what I do, I struggle a bit because it’s very varied, but it’s usually something around making web technologies more relevant to non-technology people.

    I’m here because Darren and I kept in touch following Siftware’s sponsorship of an event I put together with some other local people in 2008. And then, a couple of months ago, he asked me whether I’d like to get involved with Sw0p as a side project. I nearly bit his arm off.

    I’m not sure Darren knew (or knows!) exactly what I do either, but he’s right in thinking that I’m passionate – actually, a bit of a zealot – about the experiences that users have on the web.

    Maybe by accident, but probably by design, he also spotted that I share one of Tim O’Reilly’s latest values, to “Work On Stuff That Matters“. However great some of the stuff us geeks see, build and share on the web, a huge amount of it will be gone and forgotten in a decade. It’s almost too easy to make cool stuff now. But the question O’Reilly raises: “does it matter?” is a real one, and one I’d been looking to answer.

    What I’m getting around to saying is that I believe that Sw0p matters. I think it has the potential to be one of the most exciting things I’ve worked on, and I’m looking forward to the coming weeks and months as we get our teeth into this thing. Darren and I know that Sw0p will succeed or fail almost entirely based on how people use it, how many people use it, who comes back and who we can get to become truly passionate about how Sw0p can help them.

    At the heart of Sw0p are some simple propositions: barter and swop for free. Reduce landfill. Share skills. I’m hoping that I can bring some insight into how to make these things as intuitive as possible for everyone. It’s going to be a huge amount of fun.

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  3. A pause for thought

    January 7, 2009 by bealers

    If you’ve been waiting with baited breath for the beta release of sw0p then we sincerely apologise for being such a tease.

    We have a number of very reasonable and genuine excuses that I won’t bore you with but needless to say our initial Xmas deadline has sailed by; we’ve now put the beta release back to a sufficiently vague ‘late spring’.

    However, the good news is that even with these external disruptions going on we’ve used the time productively to ensure that when we do launch it the business will be robust and that the offering will fulfil what our research shows to be a genuine need.

    We’ve also been actively seeking to beef the sw0p team up with some awesome people. With this in mind if you think that you might be able to help us get sw0p to market then please do get in touch to discuss further.

    So, it’s still going to happen just please bear with us a bit longer.

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  4. Motivation boost

    October 12, 2008 by bealers

    I had a good time at FOWA London and have come back with increased motivation and some new ideas.

    Whilst sw0p is nearly finished from a functionality point of view it is only in a wire frame state and not something we’d want to release as a beta. The UI needs to be *tight* and we don’t want to rush it so after some thinking I’ve decided that we’ll lauch sooner than expected a v0.5 but as Facebook only for now. This will give us the double benefits of stress-testing the backend but also being able to get people using it earlier than we’d hoped.

    It has also become clear to me that whilst we’re not pimping for investment we do need a business plan as if it becomes as successful as we hope then the infrastructure and ongoing development costs won’t be cheap, so it is going to have to pay its way. We won’t be charging any subscription or upgrade costs so we’ll have to rely on advertising.

    We’ll try and get the Facebook app done within weeks not months and then release it for the beta-testers to take a look.

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  5. Shiny

    October 8, 2008 by bealers

    sw0p has a brand and this holding site has a design so it all feels much more grown up now.

    Once my trip to FOWA is out of the way we’ll be able to get back to finishing off the final 2 main development tasks before tackling the list of smaller snags. The beta launch by Christmas is still a realistic goal.

    Massive thanks go to Olly at Pepper Digital for his great work, we’re delighted with it.

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  6. Where did that summer go?

    September 24, 2008 by bealers

    Another rubbish UK summer is behind us but I’m pleased to say that it’s not been a complete waste of time as sw0p is 80% completed with no huge architectural tasks left (but loads of smaller things to nail).

    We’ve decided to simplify the business model and will open the system up free for all with no limits. After all the important thing for us is that the system gets used and really does Make A Difference. The upshot of this is that we can stop being cagey about what we’re building and start to shout about it a bit.

    With this in mind we’ve decided to accelerate the initial website rollout and are now aiming to have this introduction site branded and skinned before I go to The Future of Web Apps in October. As we’re self-funding this there’s no urgency to pimp for investment but we feel it’d be nice to drum up a bit of interest prior to the main launch later this year.

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  7. Brand discussions

    August 24, 2008 by ackers

    We had a really good meeting with Olly from Pepper Digital, in Malvern today who has agreed to take on the initial job of branding the site and coming up with the IA and page templates; on a bartering basis, naturally.

    So much to do, so little time or resources but we’ve already thought of a few other knowledgable friends who might be able to offer their expertise and skills in exchange for other goods and services, now if only there were an online tool that could make that job easier…

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  8. Making good progress

    July 5, 2008 by bealers

    With 60 hours of dev work under my belt I’m very pleased with progress. I’ve now got the majority of the basic application written and one can register, add items, watch items, and browse by categories. On the category front there’s an Ajax chooser when adding an item and using the power of nested sets the time to retrieve the category tree from the end node is blisteringly fast.

    Amongst a growing list of little jobs the big ticket TODO items are:

    • Search including postcode based location matching
    • External hosting of images with Amazon S3
    • Make offer and messaging workflow
    • Transaction workflow
    • Feedback

    On the business model front it’s really starting to come together too with a long list of legal items to check, the pricing model becoming firm and a number of ideas for the initial marketing push. We’re also starting work on the brand.

    Today I’m giving myself a change so am looking at the Facebook integration in more detail. I’ve received no response from Facebook asking when Facebook Connect would enter beta or if there were any documentation available so as I don’t really need to keep external users logged into FB all the time I’ll go with the original plan which is to use the iFrame trick to log them in remotely thus allowing us to marry their profile with the main site’s.

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  9. Two years On from sw0p’s inception

    June 11, 2008 by ackers

    Happy days. In the early summer of 2006 that we came up with the idea of a possible web-based system to aid communication between certain types of communities, particularly those based around the LETs model.

    2 years later we’re not in London, our business is doing well, the family has another member and we’ve (allegedly) enough free time and energy to devote to building, testing and marketing sw0p.com.

    Well anyway, here goes.

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  10. Development has started

    June 10, 2008 by bealers

    Welcome to the sw0p.com blog.

    Things will be a little plain around here for now whilst we refine the business model and discuss the sw0p.com brand.

    We’re going public today as work has started on the first iteration of sw0p.com, using Symfony as a base with the initial focus being on the data model & business rules with a view to get a working prototype ASAP.

    We’re very excited about what we’ll be doing with sw0p.com and as it all becomes clear we’ll be posting updates here.

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