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Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

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Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#231

Post by theonething »

lelanthran wrote: post #211
rcconf wrote: post #69

Honestly the comments are a good example on how difficult it is to sell to developers and why startup ideas that target developers are dangerous to bootstrap. Developers have high incomes, but are quite frankly, extremely cheap. And I actually mean cheap and not frugal. They will spend 40 hours/week for months to save $5/mo. There's basically no logic apart from that developers have a poor concept of time and money a…

> In this case, this tool is $30/mo, or about $360 / year, what is that, 3 dinners for 2 people in a year? The tool may save the developer, let's say 3-4 hours / week and at 52 * 3 or about 156 hours of savings a year. I think you're being unnecessarily harsh. I can afford lots of things; I don't run out and buy them though. So this tool might save you maybe 4 hours a week (I cannot really see it saving 4 hours a wee…

If you're using a paid service for work, the company should pay for it.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#232

Post by ozim »

nawgz wrote: post #201
rcconf wrote: post #69

Honestly the comments are a good example on how difficult it is to sell to developers and why startup ideas that target developers are dangerous to bootstrap. Developers have high incomes, but are quite frankly, extremely cheap. And I actually mean cheap and not frugal. They will spend 40 hours/week for months to save $5/mo. There's basically no logic apart from that developers have a poor concept of time and money a…

Do I not know how to write CSS? Why is someone else's opinionated GUI generating CSS for me adding value? Devs aren't cheap, tools like this are useless. "Don't write code - use our GUI!" has been a winning proposition almost never.

Add to that most of the time GUI is just so much more work then writing code.

I don’t have to click around to change small thing I can jump to place in file and have it changed with 2-3 moves and GUI always is open some panel find another option open pop up etc.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#233

Post by bombcar »

wpm wrote: post #228
bombcar wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has to be a reason all these companies love SaaS vs yearly upgrades and I think it’s because “subscriptions” get forgotten or ignored or “it’s not worth worrying about”.

Yup, I wouldn't mind subscriptions so much if it was a simple "one and done, keep it going if you want" deal. Ask me for $10 per month, not $10 a month, with auto-renewal enabled, impossible to turn off or difficult to find the button due to a million toxic UI patterns trying to trick me into giving up, and 2 or 3 pathetic "pwease don't go!" prompts once I do. If I buy a month, and never renew, it means I'm done usin…

All subscriptions should be the way Apple's store handles them; you can subscribe to Disney+ today, immediately cancel, and have access for the remainder of your subscription time. Then you don't have to remember it, and if you DO find you want it when you go to access it after your subscription is over, you can easily resubscribe.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#234

Post by dubcanada »

rcconf wrote: post #69

Honestly the comments are a good example on how difficult it is to sell to developers and why startup ideas that target developers are dangerous to bootstrap. Developers have high incomes, but are quite frankly, extremely cheap. And I actually mean cheap and not frugal. They will spend 40 hours/week for months to save $5/mo. There's basically no logic apart from that developers have a poor concept of time and money a…

While true, this comment is entirely US centric. $30 USD a month is not a joke to a good chunk of the world.

Just because developers in US in San Fran make $350k a year doesn't mean everyone does. And it's incredibly short sighted to assume that.

But ignoring all of that, your only recommendation is to sell it cheaper B2B... doesn't that defeat the whole purpose of keeping the $30 price?

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#236

Post by conductr »

SlowAndCalm wrote: post #31
samwillis wrote: post #17

I think the comments criticising the pricing are wrong, you can't compare one generalist tool to another highly specialised tool. But on top of that comparing to Figma, Framer or other VC backed products is a mistake, these products are priced to capture market share and grow rabidly. They are clearly underpriced. I may be wrong but CSS Pro looks like a small bootstrapped product, pricing for market growth doesn't ne…

On the subscription side, I think it's an issue as it moves the control away from the consumer when doing those upgrades. With the older, one-time purchase upgrade model, which has since fallen out of favour; I could evaluate once a year whether the updated product was worth the additional cost. With a subscription model, there's a chance I could end up funding the development of features that I neither want nor need…

You could also just cancel when you realize it's not worth it instead of sinking a large upfront on it only to find it didn't fit into your workflow. I find that a benefit as even very loved and low priced software often just doesn't fit my personal desired ways of working.

I'll try it because of hype/marketing/good Show HN/etc, and then never really adopt it. So my thought is it's better to just make it easy to cancel the subscription otherwise I'd probably never even try it.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#238

Post by mhaberl »

aceazzameen wrote: post #90
rcconf wrote: post #69

Honestly the comments are a good example on how difficult it is to sell to developers and why startup ideas that target developers are dangerous to bootstrap. Developers have high incomes, but are quite frankly, extremely cheap. And I actually mean cheap and not frugal. They will spend 40 hours/week for months to save $5/mo. There's basically no logic apart from that developers have a poor concept of time and money a…

No. Monthly subscriptions suck. Every company wants to "tax" me monthly for something that's feature complete. The ones I already pay, I do so very begrudgingly. There's simply too many SaaS products out there. Let's go back to perpetual licenses. And I'll gladly pay for upgraded versions, or not if the upgrade isn't worthwhile. When it's not SaaS, I also get to control what version I'm using. The product doesn't own…

> Let's go back to perpetual licenses.

There is a perpetual licence listed on a page; Life-time $900

> Monthly subscriptions suck.

They do. But for a SaaS biz that has to pay the bills for infra it is hard to get around it.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#239

Post by mynameisvlad »

theonething wrote: post #231
lelanthran wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In this case, this tool is $30/mo, or about $360 / year, what is that, 3 dinners for 2 people in a year? The tool may save the developer, let's say 3-4 hours / week and at 52 * 3 or about 156 hours of savings a year. I think you're being unnecessarily harsh. I can afford lots of things; I don't run out and buy them though. So this tool might save you maybe 4 hours a week (I cannot really see it saving 4 hours a wee…

If you're using a paid service for work, the company should pay for it.

“Should” and “does” are widely different.

They certainly should but it takes time to get a new tool approved and the hassle is rarely worth it.

Re: Show HN: I made CSS Pro, a re-imagined Devtools for web design

#240

Post by themerone »

earthnail wrote: post #224
bombcar wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d love to see software escrow for companies like this - something as simple as “if we stop making the software or go bankrupt or otherwise make it unable to be used, we have the source code and friends escrowed with a company that will then release it under the AGPL.”

Unlikely that this will happen. Companies rarely go bankrupt, they often just float along. Even if it did release the source code, will you really go and make it compile? There's also a lot of credentials involved; for example for getting an app on the App Store, you not only need the source code but all the developer certificates. Releasing them would violate Apple's App Store T&C. It's just not that simple in pract…

I have expensive useless licenses from multiple defunct software vendors.

It's said that 20% of small businesses fail in their first year, and 50% in the first five.

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