The first thing I asked Andres Godoy and José Daire about their new app called Hop.in — launching this week at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco — was “isn’t this just like Pinterest?” Andres was quick to note that the point of the app is not as much about the content as it is about the gesture-based controls that make sharing or logging the content a breeze. It’s about the “how” not the “what.”
The goal of Hop.in is not to be a productivity app for sharing or storing content nor is it to be a browser replacement that you use for all your iPad web browsing (although it looks pretty capable). It is instead all about offering an experiential way to search for, share and log content. When you want to lean back (ugh, I hate that silly term) and search for pictures, excerpts, or websites that interest you, this app will make that a pleasant experience.
I can see the utility here, especially as it pertains to what they used to call social bookmarking. I always liked bookmarklet services like the old Ma.gnolia or Pinboard that made it easy to archive different kinds of content. I admit, that a lot of times, I will post something to Twitter, not necessarily because I wanted to share it, but because I didn’t want to forget about it. I wanted to log it.
Hop.in seems like a good solution for that use case.
Even though their strategy is all about mobile sharing, it could still be nice to see the service expanded to a regular desktop browsing use case, so you could still use Hop.in even when you may not be relaxing with an iPad. However, since their focus surrounds gestures, that could confuse the strategy.
This app is available, for iPad, in the app store now.