Monday, April 23, 2007

buxfer reddit? the english language is doomed

Time for another week of blatant Y Combinator startup promotion in the logo doodles. The Winter Founders wrapped up a month or so ago and I extended them the same offer I made to the Summer Founders. Not that it's likely to bring them much traffic, but along with the logo, I'd promised to write an objective, thoughtful, and hard-hitting review of their site. Here goes.

The first thing one notices about Buxfer is their fantastic choice of name (i.e., "I've got no buxfer you, Steve, please spare my kneecaps"): +10 points.

The second thing one will notice is that it's actually a pretty handy way to track one's money (+5 points). All this despite not having a mascot (sorry, -5 points).

The third thing to note is how annoying it is -- despite how grammatically correct it may be -- to keep saying "one" when you really want to just say "you".

The visualizations are very sexy: the pie charts are tasty and the line graphs come with sliders and mini-histogram. But it's not style over substance, there is quite a bit of depth behind all of it -- data visualizations that even a history major can understand and use.

+15 Bonus points (because you need them) if you've got OCD and need to keep track of everything you spend. Or if you're an accountant. Either way, Buxfer is just the thing if you're jonesin' for an amateur CPA.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hmm right of the top of my head it doesn't support Safari, but ten times worse is that it doesn't let you specify the currency of transactions. Ignoring the fact that I am currently living abroad back when I was in the states I frequently bought things from the uk and canada off ebay. Accounting, ha!

alexis [kn0thing] said...

What is this "Safari" you speak of? I've heard some of my fellow Mac users mention it in the past... is it some kind of Firefox/Camino extension? ;-)

Good call on the different currencies, though. Hopefully the Buxfer guys are reading this...

Anonymous said...

Hey! I use BUXFER on Facebook as well as at the site. They added the currency changer option long ago. Try it!