If you are at an early stage and using other software that is at an early stage, then say so completely up front the way Mailpile does.
As a sibling comment stated, you've completely diluted the value of Show HN by throwing up a link to something you cannot even show.
If you want to gauge interest, then do it the way everyone else does--put up clear, unmistakable language that says you're at an early stage, in development, not ready to really take anybody at all on, and have a single email signup for receiving future info and/or early invite access.
That is how you make things clear. Here, you just farmed an email address in what, for me, amounts to a dishonest transaction by not having anything at all to provide me as part of the exchange at this time.
Don't apologize for "confusion" that was intentionally created. There is practically no chance you could have developed this site and not discussed how it was going to leave people with all these call-to-actions that had zero action behind them.
Potential users shouldn't have to figure this out for themselves.
EDIT:
Seriously, "in case there's an outlook of a finished product"? Good grief. If you're just launching trial balloons, respect interested users and HN enough to state that explicitly.
This is a joke.
You received a signup for an address from @restorethe4th.com. Please remove it from your email list.
Comments
That is not a good enough excuse.
If you are at an early stage and using other software that is at an early stage, then say so completely up front the way Mailpile does.
As a sibling comment stated, you've completely diluted the value of Show HN by throwing up a link to something you cannot even show.
If you want to gauge interest, then do it the way everyone else does--put up clear, unmistakable language that says you're at an early stage, in development, not ready to really take anybody at all on, and have a single email signup for receiving future info and/or early invite access.
That is how you make things clear. Here, you just farmed an email address in what, for me, amounts to a dishonest transaction by not having anything at all to provide me as part of the exchange at this time.
Don't apologize for "confusion" that was intentionally created. There is practically no chance you could have developed this site and not discussed how it was going to leave people with all these call-to-actions that had zero action behind them.
Potential users shouldn't have to figure this out for themselves.
EDIT:
Seriously, "in case there's an outlook of a finished product"? Good grief. If you're just launching trial balloons, respect interested users and HN enough to state that explicitly.
This is a joke.
You received a signup for an address from @restorethe4th.com. Please remove it from your email list.
We removed your email from the list and changed the wording of the buttons to make it clearer that this is WIP.
How is it any clearer? The first button says "Download for free" and the second button after entering your email says "Request Server".
The first button should say "tell me when this becomes available" and the second should say "register my interest" or something similar.