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Your app subscription is now my weekend project

rselbach.com

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Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#291

Post by timc3 »

d_sc wrote: post #15

Loved the article, thanks for sharing. I’m curious if you’d share your setup. I haven’t made any macOS apps before, primarily because I never wanted to really learn XCode and obj-c. I like swift but still prefer simpler editors like Zed/VSC vs. What XCode offers.. so when you’re building these are you doing it in XCode or in another tool like Claude Code/codex/gemini CLI? cheers

I've been using Cursor with the Swift Extension. Works really nicely, but sometimes I switch to Xcode to do some tasks such as testing that it works to build.

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#292

Post by monooso »

rhubarbtree wrote: post #233

You too can implement a slither of the features you need right now in an insecure form without hosting, support, maintenance or future development. This reminds me of the people who think they can build docsend in a weekend. No, you cannot. You can build a wee throwaway app with some of the features of docsend. But that is not equivalent to what people pay docsend for. Businesses and SaaS aren’t just a bunch of stati…

> This reminds me of the people who think they can build [some commercial app] in a weekend. No, you cannot.

If the article was claiming that you could, you might have a point.

> You can build a wee throwaway app with some of the features of [some commercial app].

Which is precisely and explicitly what the author has done.

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#293

Post by sorenjan »

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #261
sjw987 wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like an incredibly defensive take for vibe coding personal apps. Replacing some subscription app like Any.do, Google Calendar, fitness/diet tracking or basically any other CRUD-centric app, needn't be insecure, and a semi-competent developer can easily host it, continue further development (with or without vibe coding) and secure it. There's huge benefit for software developers that do find themselves usin…

>There's huge benefit for software developers that do find themselves using many of these apps with active subscriptions to make their own, tailored for themselves, and cut down their spending. I guess if you're unemployed or in an area with spectacularly low wages, and don't have any ideas of your own that seem monetizable. >Most people will continue spending $1.00/month here, and $2.99/month there. If I make 100 do…

By that logic, how much did it cost you to write this comment?

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#294

Post by [deleted] »

TheChelsUK wrote: post #271
gf000 wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the best way is you buy a software, and that version is supported "forever". The developer then creates version n+1. The old version is kept supported, but new features go only into the new version, which you can optionally buy again.

Workingcopy app is a better model. You can pay to unlock advanced features and keep them and any new features added in a year, after that any new features are paywalled for another unlock, and another +12 months, perpetually.

[deleted]

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#297

Post by trinix912 »

fragmede wrote: post #290
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There's huge benefit for software developers that do find themselves using many of these apps with active subscriptions to make their own, tailored for themselves, and cut down their spending. I guess if you're unemployed or in an area with spectacularly low wages, and don't have any ideas of your own that seem monetizable. >Most people will continue spending $1.00/month here, and $2.99/month there. If I make 100 do…

Now be the teenager with no college degree that you were before you ever made $100/hr. Most of your options then paid The vibecoded threat isn't from Devin, the threat is from 15 year old nerds who no mortgage, partner, or responsibilities. Powered by insecurity, pride, and spite, plus a generous amount of teenage hormones. I would love to see What I could have built if I had Claude back when my reflexes were still p…

Exactly. Most people are also not in the position to easily make $100/hr and be able to just burn money to "save time" with subscription apps.

There's another competition, your average folks who end up using physical notebooks, stock Notes/Calendar/... apps and Google Sheets when they figure the subscription isn't worth it anymore / they can't keep up with all of them due to rising CoL.

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#298

Post by [deleted] »

zemvpferreira wrote: post #122
SLWW wrote: post #117

I read the same tired opposing arguments all the time; I thought of it the moment I read the title. "My time isn't free, so I'll pay the tax" is true, however most of these individuals spend hours a day watching the news or doing anything else but being productive or spending time with family/friends. If you aren't working 24/7 while handling a family and telling yourself your time is worth more than a small fee, you…

Get a better hourly wage. About an hour of my month pays for all of my entertainment and software subscriptions. Another couple of hours pay for a year of iPhone. Coffee? Another hour per month maybe? We are worlds apart in our arithmetic and I don't even earn that much. If people enjoy spending their unpaid hours building clones of paid software that's fine, but it's fine because they enjoy it. It's not minimally wo…

[deleted]

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#299

Post by KellyCriterion »

throwup238 wrote: post #150
carlosjobim wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that's the standard of value other SaaS companies have to beat and very few do. Of course it isn't. Just because some products or services are great value, doesn't make other products bad value. They can be anything from good value, to average value to low value. And products / services are of course not comparable just because they are subscription based, or used on a digital device. Gas has a fantastic value, one…

> Just because some products or services are great value, doesn't make other products bad value. Sorry, but no. If they're worse value than my email and password providers which my digital life revolves around and who only charge me $5/mo each, then yes those products are a bad value. I pay $3,000/yr for Altium, $200/mo for Claude Max, $60+/mo for ad-free streaming, and begrudgingly $50/mo for Adobe so I'm not agains…

Not valid here, Sorry:

>I pay $3,000/yr for Altium,

You are definitely a professional/industryspecialist - so its quite obvious why you pay for this, same as a mechanic is paying for very important and expensive tools.

This mindest is not possible for "non-professionals" :-)

Re: Your app subscription is now my weekend project

#300

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 »

jakub_g wrote: post #105

The people who pay for the apps vs people vibecode them are largely a different demographic. Linux is free, but most people don't mind to pay the Windows / macOS tax.

Part of the AI hype is that normies can build things without learning to code. In which case, if AI is as good as some expect, wouldn't that kill all software products? What's stopping me from asking an AGI to oneshot me a photoshop clone?

I think it's more likely the case that AI is not going to be as disruptive as they think.

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