21Jul 2011
It’s official, Min.us is now Minus.com
Since our launch nearly a year ago, our focus has been on simplicity and minimalism – we just don’t believe sharing files online needs to be complicated, and our many thousands of loyal users seem to agree (thank you!). This focus on minimalism was the spirit behind our choice of domain name, Min.us.
But as we have grown, it’s become apparent that some of our users find the .us top level domain to be confusing. As we brand our service with the Minus name, we want to be as accessible as possible to all users and make it easy for users to find us.
So today we are excited to announce that we have acquired the Minus.com name, and we will use that as our primary domain name going forward.
Given that Minus is used widely to share content on Twitter and social media sites – where every character counts – we are going to continue to use Min.us for links to shortlinks for user galleries, files, photos and more. All existing links will work and redirect properly, but Minus.com will now serve as the default domain. If Min.us is your preferred URL, nothing will change for you.
Today’s change marks the beginning of some exciting developments for Minus. There’s a lot of work to be done, but we’re excited to start this new chapter with all of our users. Thank you for your continued loyalty, and please, continue to give us your feedback. We rely on it to make our service better.
Posted on Thursday July 21 2011 in General by John Xie 22 Comments
Bad idea. Takes a lot of minimalistic approach from min.us.
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Hi Tux,
We are still providing “min.us” URLs for users in gallery menu and when sharing. See http://i.min.us/ibIvVC.png
Cheers
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I think this is a good news. Min.us is really quite confusing. Keep up the good work guys!
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Hi Christian,
Thank you and yes it is sometimes confusing for new users. We’ll continue to do our best!
Cheers
John
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that’s very good!
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Thank you!
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Don’t see why min.us should be confusing. Anyway I hope as you develop this project further it will become next big thing around internet sharing services. Still it’s a lot to do until then and let’s hope you don’t pass on this project.
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Hi Edvinas,
We are definitely going to keep improving Minus, be sure to suggest features to us and help us spread the word! We’re hiring as well !
Cheers
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You should do what Instagr.am does, that is using both intead of just forwarding Min.us to the dot-com. Or best, just forward the dot-com to Min.us because the latter is better, Edvinas is right, it’s not confusing. Furthermore, the shorter IS the better when it comes to domain names.
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Hi Max,
Thank you and I understand, however we’re providing both domain names and we believe the shorter name should redirect to Minus.com to cause less confusion same as bit.ly redirecting to bitly.com but providing users with bit.ly in shortening URL.
If we get a lot of feedback to go back to min.us we’ll definitely consider. Thanks!!
John
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Edvinas & Max is right.
http://min.us/mveCsBx -> http://minus.com/mveCsBx .com sucks
Goodbye minus, it was nice knowing you
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even i think the minus.com show be forwarded to min.us
min.us IS shorter and simpler
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I feel a sense of brand fail about this move: The site stood for a practical minimalist sensibility that was uncommon on the web; this sensibility was meaningfully reenforced by the site’s URL. Not sure that going for the mass-appeal of the .com domain will help the site to stand out as a place with an uncommon commitment to delivering a clean, practical, minimalist experience. Users attracted by the distinct minimalism may be turned off by the accrual of a .com domain whose only purpose is to make the site less “confusing” to those without the web-savvy to grasp the possibility of a URL that doesn’t end in .com There may be an overall negative impact on brand identity and on brand prestige. Hope I’m wrong, though. Best of luck and keep up the good work!
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Hi Loyal Min.us,
We’re still providing Min.us URLs as default shortlink after you create a gallery. May I ask if that’s a problem? Please do send us suggestions and ideas.
Note all Min.us links will continue to work such as http://min.us/u/john
Cheers
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Hi Vijay
I definitely agree Min.us is shorter and simpler and that’s why we’ll continue to serve that link and provide that link after uploads of files
Thanks
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Hi John,
Thanks for the detailed comment and you have a very good grasp on what Minus stands for since day one, the minimalist UI approach and simple name that distinguished us.
The .us domain while simple caused us many brand awareness issues over time, having the inconsistencies of being called Min.us, Min-us or simply people unable to remember the domain name.
The domain change will allow us to be more consistent with the brand Minus, and focus more on building an even better product that focuses on simplicity and minimalism.
Thanks again and we’ll continue to do our best!
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“You are part of the revolution to Simplify Sharing! ”
Yeah that’s a problem, simplify sharing, huh? I expect simplicity which could be slightly implemented as a shorter domain, not a redirect or default shortlink, but as main domain. Agreed with John (that John commenter #13 ) moved to .com is a brand fail. He said it all.
It’s like you’re moving backwards already stands out the crowd with the min.us at the first place, yet join the .com, you’re not dropbox which now has db.tt or others that recently has their own url shortener use for social sharing. Min.us its the content it self, simplicity.
Nah, don’t sweat it, you’ll have new users. It’s not like i’m important anyway.
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Thanks for the quick response Loyal Min.us user!
I completely understand your frustration with the domain change and the move away from a simpler domain. Please understand our goal is to simplify the user experience and for many new users the .us tld was confusing, especially when referring friends to visit Minus.
We care about every one of our user and I’d love to hear more from your side and opinion on Minus, feel free to shoot me an email at john@minus.com or @min.us
and I’d be more than happy to chat over skype, phone, IM etc.. as well.
Looking forward to learning from you!
Cheers
John
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you have really simple and beautiful themplate.
what kind a layout is that?
where did you find it.
and i like minus.com
you will get traffic from around the world now.
before it was more just united states.
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Great service!
The service is easy to use. The uploads and downloads are fast.
The minimalist interface is good but a little non-intuitive (esp the icons). Consider adding small amounts of text to make it easier.
The icon text overlay does not always show (Chrome).
Couple of items for improvement
1. Increase the file-size limit to at least 200 MB, preferably 500 MB or even 1 GB if possible
It will make it easy to share video files.
A 1 min HD video is about 50 MB
2. Ads can be added at the upload/download pages for revenue e.g. 2 300×250 ads at the right.
This can help offset costs for #1 … most users won’t mind
3. The file name changes after upload – not good.
The original file name should be retained across the upload-download process
4. Can anyone delete the uploaded file?
It should be just the person who uploaded
5. “private” uploads show up in the public (?) timeline.
Is this same public timeline available to all?
The user/file privacy should be maintained at all times
6. Allow the person uploading to set an expiration time for the file, after which it gets automatically deleted from the system
All the Best!
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John Xie
July 27th, 2011 at 11:49 am
Hi Asj
Thanks for the detailed comment! We’re working on making the icons better and optimizing the experience.
Regarding your suggestions for improvements.
1) We will increase the file size, rest assured.
2) Ok
3) We will retain original file name soon for downloads
4) We have tweaked this already, so only uploader can delete files
5) Private = shows up only in your own Timeline or if others visit your gallery via Direct Link. Sorry for the confusion, we’re optimizing this.
6) Thanks for the tip. We’re thinking about doing automatic expiration for large files actually so this is something we’re thinking about.
Thanks again!
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Hi Drew
Thanks for your support and really appreciate your feedback.
We have worked very hard to take Minus where it is today.
Hope you will help us spread the word!
Cheers
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