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The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

kitze.io

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Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#71

Post by thekitze »

rob74 wrote: post #66

So, he's a fan (and paying subscriber) of his "competitor" app now, but still not enough of a fan to actually mention what app it is . Which is kind of frustrating, I read until the end of the post to see if it's mentioned, but it isn't. And it also leaves me with a nagging suspicion that the whole story may just be completely made up (or at least grossly exaggerated)...

It's not made up, I'm not using the competitor app for years, and I didn't want to give them more attention because this space is super competitive.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#72

Post by riwsky »

Culonavirus wrote: post #14

There's massive caveat with all of these "and then the story ends because we didn't just ship it :(" stories: sometimes the value of the "app" you're working on is in the technical details that cannot really be "hastened" and you can't "just ship it". Also, and this is something a lot of the managerial class people don't want to hear: Your job as a sw engineer/architect is to resist the "just ship it" pressure from t…

Engineering is tradeoffs; the whole concept of quality only makes sense in the context of a certain budget. If an engineer takes two weeks hand-crafting some one-off charts in d3 and react that could’ve been done uglier in some BI dashboard in a day, it might look good on a résumé—but it’s shitty engineering.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#73

Post by mriziq »

thekitze wrote: post #71
rob74 wrote: post #66

So, he's a fan (and paying subscriber) of his "competitor" app now, but still not enough of a fan to actually mention what app it is . Which is kind of frustrating, I read until the end of the post to see if it's mentioned, but it isn't. And it also leaves me with a nagging suspicion that the whole story may just be completely made up (or at least grossly exaggerated)...

It's not made up, I'm not using the competitor app for years, and I didn't want to give them more attention because this space is super competitive.

Tick tick tick …

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#74

Post by protocolture »

ggeorgovassilis wrote: post #6

> so I started getting suspicious if someone actually shared the video of my app with these people because they were solving literally the same problem I once met a guy who had a good idea about an app, something that became fairly mainstream two years later. He asked me to code the app for free and we'd share revenues. When asked what his contribution would be, he offered to "run" the company and otherwise his 50% w…

I was once involved in an indie game project. We had a middling idea for a crappy game but we were all hankering for software development experience in that field.

Of the 3 of us who set about coding it, 2 of us just sat down and started blocking the thing out. The third, pushed faulty code to the SVN, created a design document crediting the entire idea to himself, and then called a meeting telling us he is the game designer and he would sue us if we made the game elsewhere. The 2 of us actually contributing just looked at each other and dropped the whole thing. He basically played his cards face up and we got to see he was a pissant.

Later I did see someone with the same general idea on steam. Good for them honestly. If they came up with the idea separately, great. If they stole it from the loser, also great. If they managed to persevere under him they deserve some coin.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#75

Post by [deleted] »

rob74 wrote: post #66

So, he's a fan (and paying subscriber) of his "competitor" app now, but still not enough of a fan to actually mention what app it is . Which is kind of frustrating, I read until the end of the post to see if it's mentioned, but it isn't. And it also leaves me with a nagging suspicion that the whole story may just be completely made up (or at least grossly exaggerated)...

[deleted]

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#76

Post by WgaqPdNr7PGLGVW »

pdonis wrote: post #33
Culonavirus wrote: post #14

There's massive caveat with all of these "and then the story ends because we didn't just ship it :(" stories: sometimes the value of the "app" you're working on is in the technical details that cannot really be "hastened" and you can't "just ship it". Also, and this is something a lot of the managerial class people don't want to hear: Your job as a sw engineer/architect is to resist the "just ship it" pressure from t…

> Unless you have a stake in the company, it is NOT your job to make sure the company is the most profitable it can be. Maybe. But... > Your job is to create great software. No. Your job is to do what the company pays you for. The company is not paying you to create great software. It's paying you to solve some kind of business problem or provide some kind of business service. Some of those problems or services do in…

> Your job is to do what the company pays you for.

The problem with this mindset is the most companies are short-sighted and when the problems inevitably start coming in it is the developers who are placed under pressure.

It is the developer being paged at 2am on a Sunday. It is the developer working overtime to get the feature out because the codebase is a giant mess. Etc.

Having a minimum quality bar is a must. The OP was suggesting a professional level of quality - not gold plating everything.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#77

Post by RangerScience »

jaggederest wrote: post #53
silisili wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone extremely logic and programming oriented, I -wish- I'd met someone like that. I'm just not an idea guy, apparently. If the idea was truly good so much so you believed in it, it was a heck of an offer tbh.

I'll give you any one of 3 or 4 ideas right now, if you want them. They're ideas I'd develop if I had the time, energy and brainpower. I've got personal connections for you too, if you want them, people who need the product. I won't even ask 50%, heck, 5% sounds fine by me. My experience has been that, while that is useful, it's by no means sufficient to lead to a complete and useful tool. But I'd absolutely take tha…

Can I hit you up for one those in September if my current thing doesn't work out? Completely serious.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#78

Post by eastbound »

bruce511 wrote: post #40
Culonavirus wrote: post #14

There's massive caveat with all of these "and then the story ends because we didn't just ship it :(" stories: sometimes the value of the "app" you're working on is in the technical details that cannot really be "hastened" and you can't "just ship it". Also, and this is something a lot of the managerial class people don't want to hear: Your job as a sw engineer/architect is to resist the "just ship it" pressure from t…

I started writing a reply about how the context is very different between indie side projects and your work environment, but then your post morphed into a comment about the role of a programmer in an organisation, and so did my reply. Firstly, I sense you are frustrated in your current post and I sense you are not in step with your management or perhaps not even in step with your coworkers. I sympathize with your pre…

If we waste resources overengineering everything, it takes resources away from other parts of society that require them.

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#79

Post by RangerScience »

jaggederest wrote: post #65
silisili wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ideas are important, but remember the idea guy also was to run the company. That's a ton of work, too. In any event, while I appreciate the offer, I'm now too old and domesticated to work on it. I guess my comment should have said I'd have loved to met someone like that in my early 20s, when I had more free time and my brain worked better :).

Well, in an honest sense, that's kind of what YC's matching program does. I'm working for a company I found on there right now. It's a much different experience from job searching but it's full of people with ideas. Half or more of them are complete nonsense but any decent engineer should be able to sift the gold from the dross.

Do you have some tips for getting started on there? I poked on a few months ago, but wasn't able to make enough sense of it to get started. I think I just didn't find the right entry points?

Re: The saddest "Just Ship It" story ever (2020)

#80

Post by vouwfietsman »

Culonavirus wrote: post #14

There's massive caveat with all of these "and then the story ends because we didn't just ship it :(" stories: sometimes the value of the "app" you're working on is in the technical details that cannot really be "hastened" and you can't "just ship it". Also, and this is something a lot of the managerial class people don't want to hear: Your job as a sw engineer/architect is to resist the "just ship it" pressure from t…

> It's worth repeating: Unless you have a stake in the company, it is NOT your job to make sure the company is the most profitable it can be. Your job is to create great software

This is a terrible take, and one I generally see as a signal of lack of seniority in a software dev. It is absolutely everybody's job in the company to make sure it is profitable, unless you work for a non-profit.

The thing is though, that profitable is not the same as "just ship it". If you're in a company where those things are conflated frequently, that's a sign of lack of seniority in management.

> Your job is to create great software

It really isn't, your job is to make a great product. Making a great product often, but not always, requires great software. Many great products have terrible software behind them. The tension between product, sales and development should result in a compromise that creates the most value short, middle and long term. It is 100% your job as a developer to understand what can and cannot be hacked, what priorities the company has beside delivering great software, and finally: when great software must be made, because compromise is unwise.

Just like the boy who cried wolf, the developer who can never compromise on software quality is powerless when there is an actual reason to not compromise on software quality, and rightfully so.

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