What about a side project that isn't heavily related with tech? Which are your passions or hobbies outside work? Maybe one of them can lead you to a niche market.
You can also share your professional knowledge. Do you like teaching or writing?
Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
81–90 of 256 posts
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#82This is going to sounds like crazy advice, but having worked on many side projects in my life the last thing that's going to let you down is your skills. What you really need is time. Let's say it takes you 400 hours to build your project -- in those 400 hours, you will build up enough skills to get you started (not nearly enough to be good at it, but good enough). So you need to work consistently 1-2 hours a day on…
"What you really need is time".
This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This. This...this.
Over the last 6 months I've finally had the chance to a big bulk of my working hours to my main side-project, and it's taking shape very nicely. This is after starting it 3 years ago. Time and concentration are the biggest hurdles to getting anything off the ground.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#83Here's what I did: at work I needed something. (A git commit graph). But the one I found was #1. buggy, and #2. too expensive. It wasn't my money, but I just couldn't allow my company to pay that much. So I made my own, and fixed the bug: http://bit-booster.com/best.html And then I realized I needed a rebase button on the pull-request screen... and so it continues to evolve. Here's the thing: I've always known I'm a…
I have the strong feeling that there isn't much money in software tooling.
Also, like it or not, any successful product will eventually be replaced by an open-source equivalent.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#84If you want a stable tech stack that'll stay the same for the new few years then check out Clojure + Clojurescipt. I'm still doing the same since I started a few years ago. Regarding FE dev: I also have a technical Background (EE) and I hated any CSS (HTML isn't so bad). Though, flexbox is a life changer. It's actually enjoyable and I can get stuff done without spending hours on simple layout issues.
Can you elaborate on your tech stack? Do you develop for mobile, web, or both?
Both. CLJS is actually super fast, even on mobile (I test on lower power devices such as MOTO G4). The SPA is also pretty small if you keep dependencies out so it loads ~2-3s on a phone. That's with a large SPA with about 100+ React components.
Stack:
- It's CLJS with Datascript (huge DB), Rum and nothing else. That way I keep my js-file small (currently 170kb gzip'ed).
- Server side it's Pedestal, Cassandra, Datomic.
The tooling has always been leiningen and that's stayed consistent. Libraries are still the same on the client side. cljs.core + closure library gives you 90% of what you'd ever need. I don't use a single NPM library (Except React). I don't follow the latest fads in js-land anymore. IMO it's an ideal stack that is fast, small, stable and has much more features than anything in JS world. I don't need the latest and greatest transpiler (ES6, 8, 1000 or whatnot) since I can just use a macro that does this for me. Figwheel is incredible and should warrant anybody in the JS world to consider switching just for that... Productivity is amazing.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#85If thousands of engineers are looking for something to build that others will pay for (but can't find it), then that tells me there is something fundamentally wrong with the way the economy works. Shouldn't it be the other way around? People who have a certain need express it, and engineers just pick one and work on it.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#86If thousands of engineers are looking for something to build that others will pay for (but can't find it), then that tells me there is something fundamentally wrong with the way the economy works. Shouldn't it be the other way around? People who have a certain need express it, and engineers just pick one and work on it.
People often do not know what exactly they need and there is a disconnect between a need and the product that will satisfy the need.
No one "needs" Facebook but they do want a way to communicate and keep up with the people they love. Facebook is just one solution to that "need" but not the unique solution.
Needs exist in the world, but there needs to be an engineer to identify the need, to devise a solution that satisfies it, and to then make it available to the people who need it with an economic model that is sustainable and practical to everyone involved.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#87Another option might be looking into shopify's tutorials on drop shipping. https://www.shopify.com/guides/dropshipping
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#88Here's what I did: at work I needed something. (A git commit graph). But the one I found was #1. buggy, and #2. too expensive. It wasn't my money, but I just couldn't allow my company to pay that much. So I made my own, and fixed the bug: http://bit-booster.com/best.html And then I realized I needed a rebase button on the pull-request screen... and so it continues to evolve. Here's the thing: I've always known I'm a…
I have the strong feeling that there isn't much money in software tooling. Also, like it or not, any successful product will eventually be replaced by an open-source equivalent.
You can be both successful and open source. Look at sidekiq as an example.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#89I think you should start something very very small and forget about the money part for now. For me, my most successful project ideas came from problems that I faced during my own site launches. Since you don't have much knowledge of FE development, I would suggest you keep things Simple Stupid and try to do as much as possible with HTML and jQuery. I have created really complex websites using just PHP and jQuery (sit…
Any resources you'd recommend for learning online marketing?
You dont really need anything to start. Simply do the following:
- Talk to people about whatever problem you are looking to solve. Leverage social media and join in the conversation. Twitter is a good place to find people to talk to.
- Pay attention to the words people use. All problems have a set of specific keywords that tell you everything about how people feel about it. Use these keywords to communicate with people. Talk with their own words.
- Be consistent. Repetition is key. Say the same thing in different words. Repeating is important. Communicate the same message in similar ways.
That's pretty much what you need. Once you've learned more about the problem and those who have it, you can then leverage that data by using tools to reach more people.
Marketing (all of it) is about comminication. Listen and oay attention. Good luck.
Re: Ask HN: Building a side project that makes money. Where to start?
#90If your goal is to make money, don't allow yourself to write a single line of code until you have talked to people not related to you (and not close friends with you), heard at least two of them independently describe facing the same business problem, and heard both of them say "yes, that would help!" (or better "yes, I would buy that!") in response to your proposed solution. Finding a real business problem and a rea…
>The tech is just an implementation detail you work out later.
Are so-called "tech" startups even about technology anymore? They are more and more focused on extracting value than innovating anything. Consider the focus on sales, marketing, advertising as of late and ask yourself if the greatest minds of this generation should be spending their efforts on making people buy stuff they don't need.