Aha! Re-starting our network
This feels different. It feels real.

The last time I posted, we were finishing the OST KIT Alpha 3 PoC challenge. 200 developers had submitted projects for the opportunity to integrate the first OST Branded Token wallet features into their apps and websites (not to mention the opportunity to win a giant pile of OST). Just over four weeks later, 92 teams had completed the challenge, and successfully demonstrated token transactions using the OST KIT wallet APIs. Somehow, we were one of those teams.
Of those 92 projects, 8 were chosen as “Best of Alpha 3” and won the grand prize of 250k OST. If you want a little glimpse of the future, you should check out some of the awesome things that are being built with OST: Really Simple Store, kidtoken, Firmament, Surwei, Futured, Employees Loyalty Program, Karparc, and Joypass. Congratulations to the winners!
We were not one of these teams. It’s ok though, it really is. We had so much momentum going from that last furious week of Alpha 3 that we literally didn’t stop working. I don’t think either of us felt a sense of completion. In fact, it kind of felt like a beginning. We had barely scratched the surface of what we wanted to do, so we just dug in. Except, now that the challenge is over, things feel very different. We’re not just trying to satisfy requirements, we’re actually building something. And it feels great.
Not only do things feel different, they are different. Without question, the biggest difference is the vision. We are looking and thinking long term now, months rather than days. This affects everything. We decided to start over and build from the ground up, keeping the project’s integrity and longevity in mind.
The site’s architecture has been entirely re-designed. We chose Node.JS as the main technology solution. Node.JS is better for a RESTful approach, which will suit our Reactive front-end. Even though Node.JS is a single-threaded environment, which can result in delays with computation-heavy systems, we feel its performance, speed and scalable technology will give us better overall efficiency and productivity. We decided to use PostgreSQL as a database engine, which will offer faster speeds and better acidity.

We also created our first roadmap! And our second, our third and our fourth. Being realistic about future events is an imaginative exercise. And making a roadmap feels a little like building a stone sculpture. You’d get 4 or 5 stones in place, and then, right when you think you’ve got something solid, it comes crashing down. It’s important to set goals, though. We also made a complete pages and features list. These documents are immensely helpful in getting you to think about every tiny detail of the website.
Oh, and we re-branded. We call it Aha. We want to make something that will help people build on the confidence, the optimism, and the excitement you feel when you have that aha moment. We want to give people a way to put ideas out there early, before doubt creeps in, before time slips away, before your attention is onto the next thing.
Here’s a sneak peak…

We will get into the graphic design and UX in the coming weeks, as we continue our development on the front-end.
Thanks for hanging in with us as we re-position ourselves, and begin the second leg of our journey. We plan on documenting our developments bi-monthly, so stay tuned.
I have a good feeling about this.
About Aha
Aha is a social network for idea people. We are building the world’s first blockchain-powered idea validation tool. We are an early stage startup, and a team of two: Dave Thrasher (NYC) and Lukas Procházka (Prague). You can also follow us on Twitter @theahaapp
