Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers • Hacker News Board

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#141

Post by corpMaverick » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 2:19 PM UTC

l33tbro wrote: post #50

jasongrishkoff wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As one of those folks featured on IndieHackers ( https://www.submithub.com ), I can say that I didn't read a single interview, advice blog or anything of the sort. I just focused on rolling out an MVP that streamlined the problem I was trying to solve. I confess that to this day, I haven't read any of the other interviews on IndieHackers :-D. Oops, hope you're not seeing this Courtland <3

I struggle with this so much that I even managed to unearth a buzz term (1) for this syndrome of reading too many advice blogs. That aside, I think a lot of this is relative to where one is at in terms of education, network, support structure, access to capital, and a raft of other factors Eg, if you're an MBA with a deep and narrow understanding of a certain niche, you're not going to lean on startup blogs in the sa…

It is also a way to procrastinate. We often do it because we want everything to be perfect. It is really fear of something not being perfect what that causes the paralysis. Reading blogs is just a way to convince your brain that you are being productive. But you are not.

So forget about perfect and just do it. Once you start moving it is easier to get going. You will get a chance to improve things later on.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#142

Post by corpMaverick » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 2:21 PM UTC

kelukelugames wrote: post #49

rb808 wrote: post #10

Yeah this is the best for me: > Ship. Ship. SHIP. The overwhelming failure case among people who read interviews like this one is that they spend 98 units of effort reading about running a business for every 2 units of effort running a business. Flip that on its head. I wonder how many successful entrepreneurs actually spent time reading advice blogs when they were starting.

Haha, I've read 4 books on writing by famous authors but have written 0 books. I think I enjoy reading about writing more than actual writing.

> I think I enjoy reading about writing more than actual writing.

Exactly. I believe Paul Graham actually uses this example on one of his early essays.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#143

Post by donmatito » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 2:40 PM UTC

tixocloud wrote: post #140

donmatito wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, direct sales is a bit difficult because my core target is "Agencies that use Slack, of which clients use Slack". So I need to convince a layer of users (let say 10% conversion) and they have to convince another layer (10% again) => 1% conversion rate. What worked was publishing some articles on Medium and optimizing a bit for SEO, so that the handful of people who actually has the problem, can find me. The Slac…

Yeah, that's an interesting core target and quite pleasantly surprised that agencies themselves are using Slack. I would've guessed that the clients themselves would be the ones who would use Slack and then maybe you can work with agencies on setting Slack up for them like a concierge service of some sort.

Not a bad idea! thanks. However it starts to be a bit too involved for a side project :-D

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#144

Post by jvvw » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 2:54 PM UTC

matthewking wrote: post #40

zapperdapper wrote: post #20

All good advice, but I'm going to propose something that may be a bit contrary to current wisdom: if you really want a decent lifestyle/work-life balance don't start a business! So what's the alternative? Go contracting. Reduce your expenses to the bone, and limit the contracts you do. I now only take 3 month contracts and I do one a year. I make about £24K from that - I know many developers making double my rate. Th…

What do you do with the other 9 months of the year? side projects? travel? Id be interested to hear how your lifestyle is with all the free time. I've considered this approach myself too but more 6 months on, 6 months off. Scala in particular seems to pay extremely well (£600-£650 /day) so easy to make the money to live a comfortable lifestyle in 3 or 6 months per year. I think other dev contracts are usually around…

I've got a 2.5 day a week job as a developer in the south east of the UK, but got it by originally working there full-time and then later applying for flexible working (I have kids so had a legal right to request flexible working, although employers are allowed to turn down such requests on certain grounds). I do suspect that word of mouth would be the only way to get such a job from scratch.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#145

Post by anotheryou » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 3:23 PM UTC

dahoramanodoceu wrote: post #47

dahoramanodoceu wrote: post #46

I work one hour a morning. W00t!

Actually I should rephrase thatand say, the way I make money, my profession, takes up 3 hours of my day, counting commute time. I can live off that money. The rest of the time I just do what I want, which is what I generally consider to be 'the work.'

so what do you do? I want a piece of that cake :)

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#146

Post by tixocloud » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 3:32 PM UTC

donmatito wrote: post #143

tixocloud wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, that's an interesting core target and quite pleasantly surprised that agencies themselves are using Slack. I would've guessed that the clients themselves would be the ones who would use Slack and then maybe you can work with agencies on setting Slack up for them like a concierge service of some sort.

Not a bad idea! thanks. However it starts to be a bit too involved for a side project :-D

You're welcome. Yes, it's going to take more of your time unfortunately :( Hopefully, it'll grow to be self-sustaining? :P

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#147

Post by valuearb » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 9:08 PM UTC

ThomPete wrote: post #128

valuearb wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, you don't understand what talent is in this context, and that it's not equally distributed. There are hundreds of thousands of people who have gotten the same training on valuing companies as Warren Buffett has. But no one comes close to his long term results because the talent of doing an accurate valuation is not as important as the psychological abilities needed to make smart investment decisions, as well as…

Oh I understand what talent is. What you don't seem to understand is that Buffet isn't the rule but the exception. His wealth wasn't something he foresaw but something that happened over a long time. His insight is primarily to invest in the US market overall and everyone who did that have done well for themselves. That could might as well been wrong no one had any idea. You can read as many books and follow his stra…

He couldn't have foreseen his wealth? He was predicting it since he was a teenager.

Buffett would have beat any market, any where any time. That's what you don't understand. He didn't succeed because he invested in the US, he did better because he invested in the US. He averaged 40% returns his first 12 years as a professional investor, quadrupling market returns. He's only had a couple down years in over 50 years of investing. How is that luck? His diverse set of skills is the reason.

Again his set of skills is similar to a successful entrepreneurs skills. The average entrepreneur may only succeed 20% of the time, but a skilled entrepreneur clearly succeeds at a far higher rate.

Do you really think that someone ignorant of competitive advantages, budgeting, market research, leadership skills, etc, etc, has the same chances of succeeding as an entrepreneur as someone who is very skilled at all of them?

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#148

Post by valuearb » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 9:16 PM UTC

ThomPete wrote: post #129

valuearb wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NeXt made money for its iriginal investors and provided the OS for every iPhone and iPad ever made. Hardly a failure, let alone a spectacular one. Pixar was a tiny struggling business spun out of Lucasfilm and sold to Jobs any employees.

And because Jobs had the right connections he could help Pixar. Next wouldn't have made it on it's own.

NeXt had gotten out of hardware to massively cut it's costs (and resized it's workforce). It had a good customer base for it's software. It likely would have continued on for a long while. I believe they would have repriced WebObjects and continued to enhance it and NextOS and grow their customer base.

Pixar was a software company when he purchased control. What turned them around was their switch to making feature films. I'm pretty sure that they would have gotten distribution from anyone once Toy Story was far enough along, the question is whether they could have financed the effort. Having Steve Jobs helped a lot because he believed in them and people would return his calls.

Let me put it another way. There is a whole army of successful technology CEOs who could have run NeXt or Pixar into the ground. The fact that both became huge successes wasn't just luck, Steve Jobs played a huge role in both.

Apple was going to switch to Windows NT or buy BeOS before Jobs convinced them that NextStep was the better option. He connived Disney to partner with Pixar. Could Steve Ballmer have done that?

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#149

Post by ThomPete » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 9:37 PM UTC

valuearb wrote: post #147

ThomPete wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh I understand what talent is. What you don't seem to understand is that Buffet isn't the rule but the exception. His wealth wasn't something he foresaw but something that happened over a long time. His insight is primarily to invest in the US market overall and everyone who did that have done well for themselves. That could might as well been wrong no one had any idea. You can read as many books and follow his stra…

He couldn't have foreseen his wealth? He was predicting it since he was a teenager. Buffett would have beat any market, any where any time. That's what you don't understand. He didn't succeed because he invested in the US, he did better because he invested in the US. He averaged 40% returns his first 12 years as a professional investor, quadrupling market returns. He's only had a couple down years in over 50 years of…

Again I understand perfectly well what you don't seem to understand is that you are taking an anomaly trying to make it a rule.

Many people were predicting they would be rich were wrong. Again survivor bias.

And no he wouldn't have beat it in any market which is also why he didn't really invest in other markets and mostly advice people to do it.

But it doesn't really matter because Buffet is not useful for anything in this discussion which was about whether luck and timing played a crucial and defining role in companies success. Pointing to Buffet or Gates makes absolutely no sense what so ever anyone who invested in the US market the last 50 years would have gotten out on the good side. Just because they didn't made as much as Buffet doesn't change that fact.

You are missing the point entirely because you think that I am saying that luck and timing are the ONLY things that matter.

What I actually said was that out of the talented people there are, luck and timing become the defining factor not superhuman abilities to predict the market. The same reason the VC community in general is doing really bad and even companies like YC are mostly wrong.

There are no secrets to success. They are mostly unique stories not formulas which means they are mostly about luck and timing NOT about talent as there are plenty of talent out there.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#150

Post by ThomPete » Thu, Jul 20, 2017, 9:40 PM UTC

valuearb wrote: post #148

ThomPete wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And because Jobs had the right connections he could help Pixar. Next wouldn't have made it on it's own.

NeXt had gotten out of hardware to massively cut it's costs (and resized it's workforce). It had a good customer base for it's software. It likely would have continued on for a long while. I believe they would have repriced WebObjects and continued to enhance it and NextOS and grow their customer base. Pixar was a software company when he purchased control. What turned them around was their switch to making feature f…

He didn't convince Disney to partner with Pixar he convinced Pixar to partner with Disney as Disney we struggling not Pixar. Creativity Inc goes through the details of how those things got about.

And no Next wouldn't have made it by any stretch it was only because Jobs forced them into Apple that they survived. The world belonged to windows at that point and Next had no chance to actually do anything with that.