I built a message board where you pay to be the homepage
I kept thinking about what would happen if a message board only had one slot. One message, front and center, until someone pays to replace it. That's the entire product. You pay the current message's decayed value plus a penny to take the homepage. Message values drop over time using a gravity-based formula (same concept HN uses for ranking), so a $10 message might only cost a few bucks to replace a day later. Likes slow the decay, dislikes speed it up. The whole thing runs on three mini PCs in my house (k3s cluster, PostgreSQL, Redis Sentinel). Is it overengineered for a message board? Absolutely. I genuinely don't know where this goes. Curious what HN thinks. Archive of past messages: https://saythat.sh/history
- SaaS
✨ Résumé IA
SayThat.sh is a unique message board where only one message can be displayed on the homepage at a time. Users pay to replace the current message, with the cost decreasing over time based on a gravity-based decay formula.
Idéal pour
Individuals seeking a novel way to broadcast a message, Those interested in experimental online platforms, Users who appreciate gamified interaction models
Pourquoi c'est important
It offers a dynamic, pay-to-display homepage where message visibility is determined by a decaying value system.
Fonctionnalités clés
- Pay-to-display homepage message system
- Dynamic pricing based on message decay
- User interaction (likes/dislikes) affects message decay rate
- Gravity-based formula for message value calculation
Cas d'usage
- A brand could use this to announce a limited-time offer, with the price increasing as the offer gets closer to expiring, creating urgency.
- An individual could reserve a spot to share a personal milestone or announcement, paying a small fee to keep it visible for a set period.
- A community organizer could use it to highlight an upcoming event, with the cost to replace the announcement rising as the event date approaches.