I shipped all these apps in 2020. Most of them generated $0.

🎬 https://t.co/JAhXqsuu6h $0
🌍 https://t.co/BrNUAhfiIT $0
💡 https://t.co/ZWcLfOH4aI $0
🐞 https://t.co/aghOxYEcPI $1.99
👍 https://t.co/2JhJLe27pW $3,025 in 10 days.

But that's ok, just keep shipping! My stories👇

🎬 https://t.co/wuiBp1XsYD is the first thing I created. It's a community for indie makers. The different thing is we post updates in videos. I created it for fun as I think the world doesn't need one more text-based forum, so I make a video one. No monetization plan so far.
🌍 https://t.co/fiwjgCWho5 is a social app. The idea is from Linktree, an app to share your social links. I thought it would be cool to add more visuals to it, and meanwhile we can explore others around. I also have no monetization plan for it. Make it for fun too.
💡 https://t.co/fZfL45uvVX is a platform to connect influencers with their fans. People says it's like @superpeer. But the only difference is it's all sync. Influencers don't need to commit their time to fixed slot. Fans pay to ask questions, influencers can answer at anytime.
Continuing Influenswer... I think the product has its potential. But for now maybe I didn't find the right niche to serve. Will re-evaluate it in future.
🐞 https://t.co/RkDgmOLs3a is a tool I created for tracking backlogs for IndieLog (This is IndieLog's public page https://t.co/z5k6jhwiEt). Of course the inspiration is from @cannyHQ, but that's too expensive for solo like me. So I decided to create a light-weighted one.
Continuing Backlogs. Why I earned $1.99? Haha, it's because my silly bug. In my code, I put 199, but on Stripe side, the unit is cent, so my price becomes $1.99 😅 The price is really friendly for indie makers. But I didn't put too much effort on marketing it, then the 💵 stops.
👍 https://t.co/F5tXTxFwfD is the only one that makes some money. I said it took me 4 days from my 1st commit. But I won't deny, lots of code is re-used from my previous projects. Without previous cumulative effort, I have no way to make a profitable product in just 4 days.
I told some of my friends but I never shared it publicly that I learnt the whole web dev thing from a Udemy $9.99 course. Well, I still haven't 100% completed the course, but at least I got the idea. It totally opened up my world to create my side projects.
Luckily I have my full-time job, so I didn't mean to make any money in the beginning. I just started for fun, for solving some problems that I have, and others may have. So if you are creating your 1st app, don't expect to make even $1. If you make it, you're super lucky!
I never regret that I made several apps that didn't even generate any revenue. My core is a developer, along building those app, I am building my own tool belt. The same to you. You will learn lots nitty gritty stuff only when getting your hands dirty.
So if your indie journey just gets started, don't worry about making money. Money comes when you have better tool belt to make a better product. Money comes when your idea condensed to be a validated one. Money comes when your passion powers through any obstacles.
2021 can only be better. All the best my friends 👊

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1/“What would need to be true for you to….X”

Why is this the most powerful question you can ask when attempting to reach an agreement with another human being or organization?

A thread, co-written by @deanmbrody:


2/ First, “X” could be lots of things. Examples: What would need to be true for you to

- “Feel it's in our best interest for me to be CMO"
- “Feel that we’re in a good place as a company”
- “Feel that we’re on the same page”
- “Feel that we both got what we wanted from this deal

3/ Normally, we aren’t that direct. Example from startup/VC land:

Founders leave VC meetings thinking that every VC will invest, but they rarely do.

Worse over, the founders don’t know what they need to do in order to be fundable.

4/ So why should you ask the magic Q?

To get clarity.

You want to know where you stand, and what it takes to get what you want in a way that also gets them what they want.

It also holds them (mentally) accountable once the thing they need becomes true.

5/ Staying in the context of soliciting investors, the question is “what would need to be true for you to want to invest (or partner with us on this journey, etc)?”

Multiple responses to this question are likely to deliver a positive result.
I just finished Eric Adler's The Battle of the Classics, and wanted to say something about Joel Christiansen's review linked below. I am not sure what motivates the review (I speculate a bit below), but it gives a very misleading impression of the book. 1/x


The meat of the criticism is that the history Adler gives is insufficiently critical. Adler describes a few figures who had a great influence on how the modern US university was formed. It's certainly critical: it focuses on the social Darwinism of these figures. 2/x

Other insinuations and suggestions in the review seem wildly off the mark, distorted, or inappropriate-- for example, that the book is clickbaity (it is scholarly) or conservative (hardly) or connected to the events at the Capitol (give me a break). 3/x

The core question: in what sense is classics inherently racist? Classics is old. On Adler's account, it begins in ancient Rome and is revived in the Renaissance. Slavery (Christiansen's primary concern) is also very old. Let's say classics is an education for slaveowners. 4/x

It's worth remembering that literacy itself is elite throughout most of this history. Literacy is, then, also the education of slaveowners. We can honor oral and musical traditions without denying that literacy is, generally, good. 5/x