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The simplest app that makes money

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Re: The simplest app that makes money

#51

Post by crabmusket »

chii wrote: post #33
ehnto wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Noone parts with money for an exchange that they don't find useful. I think this is true at face value, but when we consider addiction and self-destructive behaviors it is clear that while the definition of useful my still apply, the result is a negative impact on society. The easiest most inflammatory example is drugs, but a more nuanced example might be slot machines. I won't wax lyrical about the examples, but I…

> drugs ... slot machines i would assert that drugs or slot machines both provide value - they are entertainment, and the people using them are deriving value out of it. Why is that those people's enjoyment doesn't factor into society as being positive? Are they somehow not part of society? If you imply that because they must've committed a crime to obtain the money to pay for their entertainment, then it's not the e…

I don't think anybody objects to the enjoyment of drugs or slot machines. They object to the addictive distortion of the enjoyer's mental state. The free market notion of value surely relies on the rationality of participants. Saying "it is rational for an addict to satisfy their addiction" is... well I suppose it is an argument.

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#52

Post by romanhn »

ajkjk wrote: post #25

The weird subtext of this article is that it's an example of a certain kind of person, the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, and it's only by accident that it's about doing something useful. Here's a person who reads entrepreneurship books and takes notes on good ways to find business opportunities, makes an app to help people basically cheat because that's where the money is, naturall…

As opposed to starting a business in order to make the world a better place? https://youtu.be/B8C5sjjhsso

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#53

Post by randomsearch »

chii wrote: post #26
ajkjk wrote: post #25

The weird subtext of this article is that it's an example of a certain kind of person, the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, and it's only by accident that it's about doing something useful. Here's a person who reads entrepreneurship books and takes notes on good ways to find business opportunities, makes an app to help people basically cheat because that's where the money is, naturall…

> the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, not do something useful. the fact that somebody is paying for said app implies that it is useful. Noone parts with money for an exchange that they don't find useful. The idea that just because _you_ don't see it as being useful doesn't make it not useful. If you suppose that the exchange ruins the world somehow, because there's some externality t…

I think the more generous reading here is that “usual” = “net positive for the world”

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#54

Post by CaptArmchair »

JoeyJoJoJr wrote: post #44
WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it the weird subtext? Seems to me like someone who properly thought about what he could do, did build it and then actually sold it to customers. You know, like, the basis of proper honest entrepreneurship. Or are you concerned about the use of preflop charts? Because they are clearly allowed in the rules of most tournaments and not actually cheating.

> Subtext The legitimacy of the preflop charts was also mentioned in the article - ya know, the actual written, non-subtexty text.

The author actually acknowledges that opinions on legitimate use of pre-flop charts in the poker community are highly divided. It's a controversial topic.

> Overall, the app was controversial. Many of the Reddit comments were negative, and many accused me of making an app for “cheating.” Though there was some interesting back-and-forth because many people pointed out that high-profile famous poker players openly admit to using preflop charts.

Arguably, the author wanted to build a simple app that generates sizable revenue, having your idea reviled isn't a great outlook.

However, in his case, that's not a problem since his goal was to test an idea quickly, not to build a successful business:

> Overall, I expected some controversy and some negativity. This app mainly was an experiment to make money and learn more about making watchOS apps. If it fails, it’s not too big a deal.

The elephant in the room many have is that the author didn't start from an authentic motivation to solve an interesting problem people have, and turn it into a small business, but instead was motivated by "Hey, I want to experiment with building a business" and then started looking for a problem which was a good fit for his ulterior goal.

It's a kind of thinking about building businesses that will certainly yield successful results. It's also the kind of thinking that doesn't in the slightest consider the manifold impacts of their product or service on their markets and the wider environment in which those markets reside.

As one redditor duly noted:

> And that's how you get watches banned from the poker table.

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#55

Post by s-xyz »

Its a good idea, I learned a lot from your post, and in the end its a win-win situation as you got some exposure. I would say keep it up and try to promote a bit more the app to see what comes out of it. I find the idea to charge 20USD also refreshing.

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#56

Post by geysersam »

chii wrote: post #26
ajkjk wrote: post #25

The weird subtext of this article is that it's an example of a certain kind of person, the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, and it's only by accident that it's about doing something useful. Here's a person who reads entrepreneurship books and takes notes on good ways to find business opportunities, makes an app to help people basically cheat because that's where the money is, naturall…

> the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, not do something useful. the fact that somebody is paying for said app implies that it is useful. Noone parts with money for an exchange that they don't find useful. The idea that just because _you_ don't see it as being useful doesn't make it not useful. If you suppose that the exchange ruins the world somehow, because there's some externality t…

There are many situations where the amount someone is willing to pay does not equal the value of something.

Like you point out. Anything with negative externalities is in this category.

If value is derived from peoples experiences. Why would the experience of the customer count for more than the experience of another person affected by the purchase?

Another problem is that we (people) are not always good at deciding what is good for even ourselves in the long run. We are not homo economicus with perfect awareness of all effects going forward into the infinite future. That doesn't (always) mean people should be forbidden from making "mistake" purchases that they will eventually regret. But it means the value of the thing wasn't what they thought when they bought it. In short: they're not the same.

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#57

Post by geysersam »

chii wrote: post #32
ajkjk wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the fact that somebody pays for somebody else to show me ads is useful to all of them, but it certainly isn't useful to me... I'm not saying it's illegitimate in any legal sense. But morally it is not so clear. > doing the entrepreneurial endeavor is just trying to improve their own situation This person said they work as an engineer on growth teams in Silicon Valley, which is hilariously appropriate by the way,…

> somebody pays for somebody else to show me ads is useful to all of them, but it certainly isn't useful to me... presumably the ads being shown has subsidized the usage of the app that you're using for free. So i dont think it's not useful to you - it might be an annoyance, but you've made the trade to use the app for free (or for a lower cost than it otherwise wouldve been). > They're doing morally dubious and diff…

The ad subsidized something, against my will. How can that be framed as some kind of "transaction"? Sure, if I can choose to direct or avert my attention to ads, like, using an app with ads. But in other less consensual cases it's difficult to make the case that ads are always a positive sum game.

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#58

Post by [deleted] »

omeze wrote: post #43
ajkjk wrote: post #25

The weird subtext of this article is that it's an example of a certain kind of person, the type for whom the entire point of making things is to make money, and it's only by accident that it's about doing something useful. Here's a person who reads entrepreneurship books and takes notes on good ways to find business opportunities, makes an app to help people basically cheat because that's where the money is, naturall…

This is so unfair to the article author. People do things to make money because you need money to live in society! People want to be financially and creatively independent and starting a business, or learning how, is a completely fine thing to do. You can do volunteer work, contribute to open source, or whatever else for free, but why do you have to deride someone for trying to sell software?

[deleted]

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#59

Post by ceres »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #20
jrm4 wrote: post #15

Now, everyone, think about how much worse the world would be if this was a lauded or primary way to think about "how to make software." While I appreciate the self-motivation idea generally - this article does nothing for me except make me grateful for free and open source types of folks. People should mostly just not do this.

This article made me pretty sad to be honest. This little app made more money in hours than many free software and open source projects do in years.

Well, many open source developers are quite content with making their software freely accessible without expectation of monetary gain. In fact some are strongly opposed to it (see uBlock Origin maintainer). And that’s ok too!

Re: The simplest app that makes money

#60

Post by prakhar897 »

I am in the same boat as the author. I decided that I'll take an year off my job to actually pursue some of these dumb ideas I get. After that, either I'll be financial independent enough to pursue more of them or realize that this isn't worth it.

Hence, I'm working on a Stable Diffusion + Wordle game (https://diffudle.com/). I realize now that getting traction isn't easy as it looks. I'll work on this for 1-2 more weeks then jump onto my next stupid thing.

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