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by vittor1o 1616 days ago
I've launched a couple months ago https://linkz.ai

Linkz.ai is hyperlink auto-previews that keep visitors on your website. It's heavily inspired by Wikipedia & Google Docs link preview popups with special extras. For example, when you click on a YouTube hyperlink, it does not take you to Youtube website, instead it opens lightbox with Youtube video on your website. All with just one line of code.

$500+/m in a first month

Demo page: https://linkz-ai.webflow.io

6 comments

Super interesting, I added this (albeit way less pretty) to my personal site and generally got poor reviews. That being said, I'm really enthusiastic about the idea.

Example here: https://blog-545pd1vjp-sambroner.vercel.app/

Try adding Linkz.ai previews on your blog posts, and get another round of feedback :)
This has some neat use cases but I dearly hope it doesn't become the norm...
Can you elaborate a bit?

Technically rich link previews save visitors from the tab-overload.

I have nothing against the previews. However when a website hijacks the link to serve a stripped down version of the content locally, it goes against the expectations of the user, and it can really f*k up accessibility tools. This is a bad use of javascript imo. A really bad use. And unfortunately it is being pushed as a way to retain users, meaning that it prioritises profits over everything else.

I don't want to be served a fullscreen auto playing video in a pop-up window when I click on a YouTube link. I want to go to YouTube and view it there, where I can like, subscribe, comment, and so on. It breaks my expectations in a bad way, and I can see why people are growing increasingly frustrated with javascript on websites due to this.

Sorry for being so negative about this. It's a cool concept, but I also really hope that this never becomes the norm. And that's coming from a web developer, someone that's usually cheering on all advancements in the web.

I do sometimes get similar first impressions, though when you look closer at the implementation - the very opposite of your comments is true.

Accessibility of the previews has been thought through & tested. The previews are clearly marked when they open in a lightbox. When you are using a screen reader, the experience improves(!) significantly; on click you get the content right away, not a website in a tab where you need to find the content, and remember that some websites were not tested for accessibility by their devs.

Separately, you can always do, CMD+Click and get the same auto-playing video on Youtube.com in a new tab to like, subscribe & comment. Or click a direct link within a preview to go to YouTube website when you feel that you need to like, subscribe & comment.

And for what it worth, Linkz.ai makes a planet a bit greener with less traffic going back & forth and less CPU & energy used to render a preview vs. a full-featured website :)

> The previews are clearly marked when they open in a lightbox.

Oh, I didn't realize that because I was on mobile.

> on click you get the content right away, not a website in a tab where you need to find the content

This is quite nifty for sites like Soundcloud and YouTube that offer an embeddable version of their content

> Separately, you can always do, CMD+Click

This isn't working for me (Firefox, MacOS)

The rich previews on hover are great. I was referring to the "Immersive Previews", and for the things demoed on your landing page like short forms and Youtube videos, they're a nice experience. I worry about a world where every "sticky" web platform gets caught in an iterated prisoner's dilemma and all decide it's in their best interest to do this. In this world, whenever I want to click a link off of Instagram or Twitter or NYT I end up in an "Immersive Preview" iframe of the site I expected to navigate to. Google AMP everywhere.

I would _love_ a world where this kind of thing is closer to a first-class feature of the web -- thinking of Xanadu-style transclusions or even Google's abandoned(?) <portal> element. I would love deep-linking from Github->Jira->Github in the same tab, and this points the way towards that. But if there are a dozen implementations of it floating around, and users have no control or warning over when a link behaves this way, it's just another way to wrest control of the browsing experience away from them.

Please be mindful about how you advertise this, is what I'm saying.

this is really good idea, how comes not many sites/companies/people use it?
I've just started this product late last year; the response has exceeded my expectations.. give it a few more months for sites/companies/people to adopt :)
how do you get your users?
A few channels right now:

- Participating in the web dev communities

- "Powered by Linkz.ai" footer in the Link preview popups

- Campaigns on Product Hunt, Reddit & similar

- Soon: Affiliate, LTD, targeted ads for Webflow/Squarespace ecosystems

I really like the logo and web design.
What a great idea ! Why .ai though ?
Hyperlinks with artificial intelligence ;)