If I may, I'd like to comment on my initial impression:
Bland. Sorry. I know minimalist is all the rage these days, but I (speaking only for myself) would prefer more of a grid-image-based view of the projects.1)It'd add some flare; otherwise it just reminded me of stackoverflow. 2) While I think of developers as largely rational, if your sales pitch is going to be "make a difference", you'll probably need to appeal to people's emotions, personalizing the projects, making people feel something. Loving the idea, though.
Thanks very much for the feedback - I agree. Neither of us founders are designers. However, we've now got a great designer working with us, and we'll have a new look in a few weeks. Others have mentioned wanting images for projects, and that's definitely something we're considering. However, we have to balance it with not wanting to make it hard for people to post projects.
A lot of charities, for example, are already tentative about asking programmers for help, and we're a bit concerned that asking them to produce a pretty picture could put them off posting. Ideas for how to have the look without putting off posters are very welcome.
You guys probably have more important things to to think about, but when it comes to personalizing projects, here are my thoughts:
1) Not everything will sound or seem uber exciting, so the only images they will be able to post will be generic getty ones or none, making them look inauthentic or just plain.
2) Have you thought about, uhm, video proposals maybe? Something like webrtc could make it pretty easy to record using the posters webcam, without making it more challenging to post. It'd personalize the post, make it easier to relate to, put a face to the project. webrtc + html5
Can't really come up with anything else off the top of my head, but I wish you luck.
Yes, someone else also suggested video postings. At the time I argued that it needs to be optional to keep friction low, but I do agree it's a great way to get people engaged! We'll definitely keep this in mind and take your suggestions on board. Anything we can do to pull people in to help is a good thing.
Bland. Sorry. I know minimalist is all the rage these days, but I (speaking only for myself) would prefer more of a grid-image-based view of the projects.1)It'd add some flare; otherwise it just reminded me of stackoverflow. 2) While I think of developers as largely rational, if your sales pitch is going to be "make a difference", you'll probably need to appeal to people's emotions, personalizing the projects, making people feel something. Loving the idea, though.