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Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

shant.nu

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Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#101

Post by acchow »

bdw5204 wrote: post #39

Where the author made a mistake was in trying to make "what the market wants" rather than just making stuff he/she actually wanted to make and trying to see if it was possible to make money from it. If you try to make "what the market wants" rather than what you want, you're going to make garbage and further saturate a market that is already filled with garbage that was designed to cash in on "what the market wants".…

> If you try to make "what the market wants" rather than what you want, you're going to make garbage

100% agree. This is also why so much music is commercial

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#102

Post by lisasays »

wvenable wrote: post #93
bdw5204 wrote: post #39

Where the author made a mistake was in trying to make "what the market wants" rather than just making stuff he/she actually wanted to make and trying to see if it was possible to make money from it. If you try to make "what the market wants" rather than what you want, you're going to make garbage and further saturate a market that is already filled with garbage that was designed to cash in on "what the market wants".…

> Where the author made a mistake was in trying to make "what the market wants" rather than just making stuff he/she actually wanted to make and trying to see if it was possible to make money from it. If you want to make a business, you must make what the market wants. Making your own stuff and trying to make money from it is possible, but it's no longer a business. I'm a professional software developer and a hobbyis…

If you want to make a business, you must make what the market wants. Making your own stuff and trying to make money from it is possible, but it's no longer a business.

Right, we get it - but it's not binary, and in turns out there's considerable room for nuance. In fact some of the happiest and most genuinely successful people I know got there from figuring out how to navigate this valley, and knowing when to trust their gut.

It also has a lot to do with taste -- specifically for stuff that is awesome and cool, but just a bit below the radar, as it were.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#103

Post by brianpan »

uncertainrhymes wrote: post #82
noelwelsh wrote: post #12

I think people who have never run a business believe that running say, a bakery, involves baking all day. Anyone who has ever run a business should know that is false. Running a business involves doing all the stuff around the main task (marketing! accounts! infrastructure! customer support!) so that the people doing the main task can get on and do it. If you understand this you won't turn your hobby into a business…

I've met many people who love beer and think they should start a brewery. All I can tell them: I hope you like cleaning. Really like it, because that is what 90% of the job is.

This is how I felt when I got one of the original Roombas. It's great if you don't like vacuuming but really like robot cleaning and maintenance.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#104

Post by TheNewsIsHere »

pessimizer wrote: post #62
a13n wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, at the same time, I think the problem a lot of entrepreneurs have is that they overfocus on "what you are interested in" instead of "what the market wants", and therefore build something that nobody wants. If you can find a perfect intersection, that's beautiful, but probably uncommon. Some of the most lucrative businesses are stuff like (anti)fraud/security/payments that is pretty darn drab.

> they overfocus on "what you are interested in" instead of "what the market wants" One sure difference between these two things is that you absolutely know what you are interested in, but your opinions about what the market wants are going to be speculative until you have customers. edit: i.e. judging what you think is beautiful vs. a Keynesian beauty contest.

I agree with pretty much this whole chain of comments, at least in spirit.

As someone who has turned his interests into his business, it really can be tough. I have always loved infrastructure, and I have always loved maintaining certain applications and workload types.

On the one hand, you do start to understand after awhile what the “MVP” looks like. On the other hand you can eventually fairly well predict what your top feature requests will be right out of the gate.

Integrating the two effectively while actually getting something out the door can be a real challenge. I have criticized many firms and offerings for not having “basic feature X,” but as someone who is building a product that’s effectively never complete, I’m sure someone could say that to me too, about at least a few things. Some come immediately to mind.

And I’m still sort of surprised at times by what my own customers do and do not want or ask for, or even care about. When my interests are aligned with theirs, the product/service can move forward really quickly. When they’re not, it can be a struggle to iterate effectively.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#105

Post by kodah »

twodave wrote: post #97
kodah wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How do you prioritize your time? When I worked in an office this was difficult. I had to assign values to certain activities, sometimes subliminally. For instance, being that my personal coding was a lot more creative it sometimes taught me concrete enough patterns that I could take to work. That made it a higher order of value. I was making enough money at my day job that consulting wasn't needed , but I took less…

Ha, I started a little kombucha brewery as well, and ended up ditching it because it was too much work to "always have kombucha". The supplies instead now sit in my cabinet and mock me. Thanks for letting me peek into your routines a little. I think I see a couple things here I can implement myself without totally upending my life.

Take it day by day! None of what I do was planned overnight. I just began incrementally incorporating new things in as I saw opportunities and potential commitment.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#106

Post by sgbeal »

VoodooJuJu wrote: post #18
lynx23 wrote: post #3

This is why I never attempted to find a programming job. I am the typical nerdy polyglot, having dabbled in a two-digit amount of programming languages. But I somehow always knew, if I had to do this 8 hours a day, for projects I am likely not intrinsically motivated to work on, I'd likely hate it after a few weeks. I envy those which managed to make this passion into a paying job without loosing the love for it.

This is exactly why I'm pursuing programming. I hate it with a passion. I'm an artist at heart, so programming is a great fit because, not only does it pay much more than art, it's completely artless, so it won't ruin my desire for making art at the end of the day.

> ... it's completely artless,

Then you're obviously doing it wrong. Programming with passion, is an art unto itself.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#107

Post by lostlogin »

brianpan wrote: post #103
uncertainrhymes wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've met many people who love beer and think they should start a brewery. All I can tell them: I hope you like cleaning. Really like it, because that is what 90% of the job is.

This is how I felt when I got one of the original Roombas. It's great if you don't like vacuuming but really like robot cleaning and maintenance.

I like trying to reseat it on the charger multiple times per day.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#108

Post by siva7 »

a13n wrote: post #47
bdw5204 wrote: post #39

Where the author made a mistake was in trying to make "what the market wants" rather than just making stuff he/she actually wanted to make and trying to see if it was possible to make money from it. If you try to make "what the market wants" rather than what you want, you're going to make garbage and further saturate a market that is already filled with garbage that was designed to cash in on "what the market wants".…

Eh, at the same time, I think the problem a lot of entrepreneurs have is that they overfocus on "what you are interested in" instead of "what the market wants", and therefore build something that nobody wants. If you can find a perfect intersection, that's beautiful, but probably uncommon. Some of the most lucrative businesses are stuff like (anti)fraud/security/payments that is pretty darn drab.

For all i’ve seen over the many years in the industry i’m pretty sure founders who make only things they’re interested in are a pretty small club. The vast majority of all the crap and startups you’re seeing here are doing exactly what they believe is „what the market wants“ because that’s what they’re being taught all the time here. Heck, most of Show HN gives me rather „what the market wants“ vibes let alone YC applications.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#109

Post by marcianx »

HWR_14 wrote: post #98
satellite2 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but no. It's always with disappointing rewards tgat those studies are done. Pay people considerable amount and then compare.

That's a different question. People like money. People may like the activity and the money combined more than just the activity. But the studies show that they like it less than the activity and the money not tied to one another. If Bezos wrote me a large enough check to never participate in specific hobbies again, I would take him up on it. I would be happier than before I took the offer. But I would clearly be even…

I don't take it that way, and I'm deeply fortunate to be living the life suggested by GP. If I get to do what I'm passionate about even if it includes the closely-related grungy part to make it successful (not an altogether different job like marketing) and I am paid enough money to not have to worry about my daily needs and retirement savings, then I have a chance to spend a solid part of my productive day on it, engaging deeply, and building a deeper intuition, all the while not having the personal worries of stability at the back of my mind. My passion no longer needs to compete with my work for my mental energy. And I get to work with talented people who complement my skill, doing the part they enjoy and I don't, to make what we collectively build successful.

That being said, I'm a software engineer, and that's a really fortunate occupation to be passionate above due to the breadth of its applicability (e.g. allowing one to work more closely on my topic of interest) and salary potential.

Re: Turning my hobby into a business made me hate it

#110

Post by rj45jackattack »

bdw5204 wrote: post #39

Where the author made a mistake was in trying to make "what the market wants" rather than just making stuff he/she actually wanted to make and trying to see if it was possible to make money from it. If you try to make "what the market wants" rather than what you want, you're going to make garbage and further saturate a market that is already filled with garbage that was designed to cash in on "what the market wants".…

I made an account after years of lurking to say. This is it.

I use to make and sell a very specific piece of hardware. The only reason I started a shop was to sell my surplus. It cost roughly the same for 1 as it did for 20. So I started selling them for $2 more than I paid and sold out. Then I did it again, and again. I sold about 100 units all together and never once did I hate my hobby during this time. At the same time, it never paid my bills. Nor did I ever think of quitting my job.

Is there a name for flipping a hobby into a full blown career? Does Flanderization fit?

I had to stop after the whole shipping shitshow during covid. Prices in my country have not recovered yet.

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