I created a website to help new users traverse the bitcoin landscape

[alonshvartsman]

As the title suggests, my name is Alon and I created a website to help new users traverse the bitcoin landscape.
Trusted exchanges, secure wallets, nearest ATMs, most efficient mining equipment, and more. Took me a good 6 months but I'm hoping it pays off and helps some people.
The site is www.bitrawr.com
I welcome any and all heart-breaking criticism.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I like this a lot. Lots of simple to understand and no-nonsense advice. Great work. A few suggestions:

The price converted would be better if it was on a single page with drop down boxes to choose which currency to convert from and to. Other fiat options rather than just USD would be good too.

The charts page is showing blank for me.

On the landing page, under "Bitcoin News", there is a spelling mistake - "inlcuding".

On your wallets pages, it would be nice to include two other things - firstly, a brief mention about seed phrases and that they should always be kept off of electronic devices, and secondly, a brief mention that software wallets should be verified prior to installing to protect the user from having their coins stolen.

I would love to see some more decentralized exchanges on your "Buy Bitcoin In" pages, but I appreciate they are not the most newbie-friendly, so I can understand if you would rather not.

Keen to see how you develop this further, particularly the Beginner's Guides. One quick question - how are you funding this? I see you have some referral links to various exchanges and hardware wallets, but that's unlikely to generate enough revenue to pay your costs. Are you planning on selling ads, "promoted" slots for news stories, or something similar?

[alonshvartsman]

I like this a lot. Lots of simple to understand and no-nonsense advice. Great work. A few suggestions:

The price converted would be better if it was on a single page with drop down boxes to choose which currency to convert from and to. Other fiat options rather than just USD would be good too.

The charts page is showing blank for me.

On the landing page, under "Bitcoin News", there is a spelling mistake - "inlcuding".

On your wallets pages, it would be nice to include two other things - firstly, a brief mention about seed phrases and that they should always be kept off of electronic devices, and secondly, a brief mention that software wallets should be verified prior to installing to protect the user from having their coins stolen.

I would love to see some more decentralized exchanges on your "Buy Bitcoin In" pages, but I appreciate they are not the most newbie-friendly, so I can understand if you would rather not.

Keen to see how you develop this further, particularly the Beginner's Guides. One quick question - how are you funding this? I see you have some referral links to various exchanges and hardware wallets, but that's unlikely to generate enough revenue to pay your costs. Are you planning on selling ads, "promoted" slots for news stories, or something similar?

These are great suggestions. Went one-by-one and created a little plan on implementing. Fixed the spelling error just now The chart should be working, just takes a little bit of time to load.
I'll start creating guides on wallets and mining to further deep dive into best practices and such.

At the moment, all costs are going out of my pocket. I won't be adding any ads, or promoted slots anytime soon. I want to keep the site as polished as possible. Feel free to keep up with me on Twitter @alonshvar.

[hugeblack]

Can I know the database that the site was based on in the search? Or even search algorithm?

Unfortunately, I tried searching for my country, "United Arab Emirates". The results of the research were similar to other countries and ignored famous exchange platforms like Rain & BitOasis.
So update your database will and the search engine "I need to write full name of country."

The rest of the pages need a lot of development, but the most important is the research database.

I can add more later.

[Kakmakr]

The website looks very good, but why did you choose that domain name --> https://www.bitrawr.com/ (What does it mean?)

The price ticker at the top right hand side of the page looks good too, what are you using for the source data for the price that are reflected there?

I like the fact that you have some of the most popular hardware wallets listed on the site, with a short comparison and a recommended retail price.  

You can see that you put a lot of time and effort into this website and that it will become one of the better resources out there. I will surely add it to my list for Newbie guides.

[Lucius]

Unfortunately, I tried searching for my country, "United Arab Emirates". The results of the research were similar to other countries and ignored famous exchange platforms like Rain & BitOasis.

I can only confirm that in my case (EU), I also do not see any local exchange, only the main ones are listed. And when you take a closer look at where the links go, then it is clear that in some cases it is ref links (Binance). It is hard to expect that local exchange will be listed in such list because it takes a lot of time and research and financially brings no benefit (no ref links). I don't mind that the OP is financing its project through ref links, it's quite legitimate.

I have to admit that I was really surprised to see a hardware wallet on the site that costs as much as $1500

[alonshvartsman]

The website looks very good, but why did you choose that domain name --> https://www.bitrawr.com/ (What does it mean?)

The price ticker at the top right hand side of the page looks good too, what are you using for the source data for the price that are reflected there?

I like the fact that you have some of the most popular hardware wallets listed on the site, with a short comparison and a recommended retail price. 

You can see that you put a lot of time and effort into this website and that it will become one of the better resources out there. I will surely add it to my list for Newbie guides.

Thanks a lot Kakmakr! The "bit" stands for Bitcoin and the "rawr" is the sound a dinosaur makes, translated by some to mean "I love you". So I just put those two together and thought it would be a good short domain for newbies. The price data is being fed from the Coinbase API.

It took a while to gather and create all the data so I appreciate the positive feedback. Let me know where I can see your list for newbie guides.

[alonshvartsman]

Can I know the database that the site was based on in the search? Or even search algorithm?

Unfortunately, I tried searching for my country, "United Arab Emirates". The results of the research were similar to other countries and ignored famous exchange platforms like Rain & BitOasis.
So update your database will and the search engine "I need to write full name of country."

The rest of the pages need a lot of development, but the most important is the research database.

I can add more later.

The database and search are all proprietary and built by me. I'm working every day on making the site better so check it out. BitOasis has been added

[btccashacc]

I don't know if it just me that the dropdown button for the country is a little bit lagging when I clicked it (I'm using chrome btw), anyway I like the UI it is very simple and clean. I just wanna suggest some features that maybe people can log in to your site and give some feedback about the exchange, so other people can get information and review from users about the exchange that they're looking for.

[webtricks]

I really liked the concept of your website. It can turn into a successful concept mainly because bitcoin.org doesn't cover the topic of buying/selling Bitcoins. However, you need contributions from other people too. I searched for 'India' and exchanges shown are either no longer operational or are global exchanges which don't provide specific service in Indian Rupee. Current active and popular exchanges like WazirX are not mentioned.

I know it is hard for single person to collect all information because you are not fully aware of the Bitcoin's situation in different countries. That's why it would be better if others contribute to your initiative too.

For current active and trusted Indian exchanges, check the Traders section of this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5177490.0

[Theb]

Are you a one-man team developing this website? If you are I don't think you can handle every topics your are putting in your website. Even if you say your niche is Bitcoin you are covering ablot of things from exchanges, ATMs, mining equipment, and news and I don't think one person can do it especially if you are thinking about how you will update it daily, your quality will obviously drop. Not unless you will be adding more members part of your team I don't think it will be a good idea to keep a crypto website to general like yours. I'm not saying that a one-stop shop kind of website is bad but what I'm saying is that it will be too much to handle just by one person.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Another idea occurred to me OP that I think would make a worthwhile addition to your site: Where to spend bitcoin. The whole point of bitcoin, after all, is to be a currency.

It wouldn't require much effort to make a page - you can simply include links to other directories of businesses and shops which accept crypto. Here are a few you could use:

Spending-bitcoin.com - The biggest directory of online stores accepting Bitcoin! - directory of over 1000 physical and online stores
https://coinmap.org/ - global map of over 15,000 stores
Gift card providers - good list of providers of gift cards and some prepaid debit cards

[alonshvartsman]

I don't know if it just me that the dropdown button for the country is a little bit lagging when I clicked it (I'm using chrome btw), anyway I like the UI it is very simple and clean. I just wanna suggest some features that maybe people can log in to your site and give some feedback about the exchange, so other people can get information and review from users about the exchange that they're looking for.

I was actually thinking about adding user reviews and ratings so that other people can benefit from others experiences'. Definitely a priority. It's a bit laggy due to asset caching (Something I need to do on my end, not yours).

[alonshvartsman]

I really liked the concept of your website. It can turn into a successful concept mainly because bitcoin.org doesn't cover the topic of buying/selling Bitcoins. However, you need contributions from other people too. I searched for 'India' and exchanges shown are either no longer operational or are global exchanges which don't provide specific service in Indian Rupee. Current active and popular exchanges like WazirX are not mentioned.

I know it is hard for single person to collect all information because you are not fully aware of the Bitcoin's situation in different countries. That's why it would be better if others contribute to your initiative too.

For current active and trusted Indian exchanges, check the Traders section of this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5177490.0

Yes it did take quite a long time to gather all the information for each exchange which I was I started with the bigger, more well known exchanges. I tried my best to locate the best local exchanges in places like Ukraine, Russia, Mexico, Argentina, etc due to there being a lot of resources available on them. I'll check out the thread and research WazirX now.

[alonshvartsman]

Are you a one-man team developing this website? If you are I don't think you can handle every topics your are putting in your website. Even if you say your niche is Bitcoin you are covering ablot of things from exchanges, ATMs, mining equipment, and news and I don't think one person can do it especially if you are thinking about how you will update it daily, your quality will obviously drop. Not unless you will be adding more members part of your team I don't think it will be a good idea to keep a crypto website to general like yours. I'm not saying that a one-stop shop kind of website is bad but what I'm saying is that it will be too much to handle just by one person.

Yes, I am a one man team. You can see me here if you feel like following https://twitter.com/alonshvar
It's quite a lot to handle but this is a project that I want to take far. I want people to learn about bitcoin and not be thrown down the rabbit hole of misinformation and scams.

[Globb0]

Nice one.


Fair play to you for getting off your ass and doing something.

Good luck with the project.

[Zicadis]

Pretty nice website, it's always nice to see somebody bringing high-quality resources into the space.

How do you plan to monetize the website? I couldn't see any adverts on the site, is it going to be purely affiliate based? If so, can you guarantee that your site will be free of bias?

A lot of platforms offer lucrative affiliate rates, but are shady as hell, I would hate to see your site be lured in by these.

[suzanne5223]

From my own point of view, you have done a wonder job buddy despite the site is yet to be finished but it will be nice if the bitcoin ATM location map have a portal/search box where user can just type their current location and see the nearest bitcoin ATM to them.

[TedMosby]

Same like webtricks, I visited your website to try it.
I searched for my country, Indonesia. I only found information about the exchange market.
According to the data on your website, there are 7 exchange markets found in Indonesia, but only one of them that correct.

I wonder how did you collect the data?
Also, can the user submit their data to your website?

[alonshvartsman]

Same like webtricks, I visited your website to try it.
I searched for my country, Indonesia. I only found information about the exchange market.
According to the data on your website, there are 7 exchange markets found in Indonesia, but only one of them that correct.

I wonder how did you collect the data?
Also, can the user submit their data to your website?

I collected all the data myself following about 6 months of research while building the site. Which exchange is the only one that is correct for Indonesia?
You are more than welcome to send me an email regarding any changes you feel should be made alon@bitrawr.com