During a technical debate, the authors and supporters of Ta-da List claimed that their technology was shorter and quicker to write than anything else. They claimed it was a revolution in web application development. We created Bla-bla List to prove that other technologies are equally viable and make it possible to offer even more without much additional effort.
We noticed that a number of Ta-da List features could be improved upon and that creating a flexible and open-source back-end for developers would open up another world of possibilities.
Slick. Free. Open source. Better than Ta-Da list? You decide, but make sure to leave any fanboy 37signals biases at home.
I’ve heard these arguments before, but I think what this “proof” experiments fail to take into account is the time taken to explore, experiment, and innovate. That’s what 37signals did in short order, and what a site like this is failing to do.
It took Amazon a ton of time and money to come up with an online shopping experience that worked well. It then took some guy in India about a week to reverse-engineer it and release a shopping web app that worked similarly.
37s innovates quickly and effectively, and that’s their strong point. Anyone can reverse engineer their work and program it as fast or faster — but so far very few folks have been able to do comparable things from scratch without having a precedent.
I thought this was a joke! I thought they were parodying F/OSS clones of products with buzz word explanations :P
Even if Bla-bla List turns out better, 37s does deserve credit for responding to an obvious need (we had databases, but we didn’t have a decent to-do list for a long time) and creating a great product.
Sometimes people get carried away trying to make OpenSource versions of everything.
am I the only one who has no idea what the hell you’re talking about?
Depends on who you are talking to.
I’m with you, JC. I don’t understand Ta-da lists to begin with. Basecamp I understand — Ta-da lists I do not.
I’m sure they’re useful for some people, but I’ll stick to Post-its and Outlook Task functionality.
http://taskthis.darthapo.com/
Is actually much more impressive.
I’d agree with Matt – Taskthis! has the whole quality look ‘n’ feel down, which 37s also do very well, that instantly breeds confidence in the product.
Blabla List doesn’t. It looks amateur at best.
Are you not a 37s fan then, Scrivs? :)
I guess there’s always a backlash against things that appear to be bandwagons. RoR is just the latest in a long line…
I imagine someone will come up with the “Blue Fade Technique” just to compete :p
Oh I love 37s. They got me into the web design game, which I subsequently left. But I also like competition so to speak.
im gona get u, u sad little poo faces