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Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

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Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#101

Post by NKCSS »

I created a WPA(2) password lookup web-based service in April of 2008:

https://www.nickkusters.com/en/Services/Thomson-SpeedTouch

I just added ads and it's made 50-300 a month (had ~1000 unique visitors a day for the last 8 years).

Added https://www.nickkusters.com/en/Services/UPC last year for a different brand model

And

https://www.nickkusters.com/en/Services/DownloadFundaImages for the Dutch real-estate market

And a few years ago, I reverse enginered the encryption of the Wordz game and post the new game 20-30 seconds before the new roud starts, and more: https://www.nickkusters.com/nl/Diensten/WoordJacht/

This combined is my hobby/fun website. It used to cost €300 a month in server fees; it's now down to €80. Over the lifetime of the site, I probably broke even :) But it's still used daily, generating ad revenue, and if I had put in time to cut down cost, I could have made some money.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#102

Post by altitudinous »

andyjdavis wrote: post #100
altitudinous wrote: post #95

I have several apps on the iOS app store. I make between $4000AUD - $9000AUD per month. I quit my job 3 years ago to do it, so I guess it isn't really a side project any more. That said, it is a lonely way to make money and I am over it. My career was computers, and I'm pleased I've done the apps, I can achieve anything technical so it isn't a challenge any more and am looking at something more physical, hands on. Wh…

Nice work :) No matter what you do next that is certainly a very handy chunk of change to have coming in each month.

Thank you :)

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#103

Post by NKCSS »

altitudinous wrote: post #95

I have several apps on the iOS app store. I make between $4000AUD - $9000AUD per month. I quit my job 3 years ago to do it, so I guess it isn't really a side project any more. That said, it is a lonely way to make money and I am over it. My career was computers, and I'm pleased I've done the apps, I can achieve anything technical so it isn't a challenge any more and am looking at something more physical, hands on. Wh…

Care to post some links? Always nice to see some context.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#104

Post by ricw »

Built www.sum-reviews.com over the course of a year (14 months), probably 2-3 man months of full time effort. It's now pretty automated though not enjoying the marketing part as much, that a more mature project requires. Having said that, it's kind of self entertainment / joy.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#105

Post by leviathan »

2 years. I built ( https://itunes.apple.com/app/id714882169?mt=8 ) three years ago as an idea to test shooting videos at 60fps on the iPhone. At the time there was no iPhone 6 and you couldn't shoot 60fps videos with the default camera app. I did zero advertising of the app, and it's currently bringing in around $100/month.

I have a major update that I've been working on for the last 2 months, but other than that it seems to be running all by itself.

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#106

Post by altitudinous »

NKCSS wrote: post #103
altitudinous wrote: post #95

I have several apps on the iOS app store. I make between $4000AUD - $9000AUD per month. I quit my job 3 years ago to do it, so I guess it isn't really a side project any more. That said, it is a lonely way to make money and I am over it. My career was computers, and I'm pleased I've done the apps, I can achieve anything technical so it isn't a challenge any more and am looking at something more physical, hands on. Wh…

Care to post some links? Always nice to see some context.

Thanks for asking, but I'd like to retain my anonymity for now :) I also have enough competitors at the moment!

Re: Ask HN: Do you have a profitable side project? How long did it take to achieve?

#107

Post by nevster »

nevster wrote: post #38

A year. I was spending way too much time on eBay, so I wrote something for myself that would scrape the web pages and use a kill list to filter out the junk. I wanted a better UI to add words to the kill list and realised I could make money via the eBay affiliate program. So I took two months off between contracts and wrote the first version of AuctionSieve - http://auctionsieve.com There was a D&D forum, the Acaeum…

For those curious, it makes about $500 or so per month. At one point it was making $2000 per month but eBay changed the payout strategy - one thing to be aware of when dealing with affiliate programs.
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