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Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

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Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#11

Post by TallboyOne »

I built http://pineapple.io all on my own in a matter of months (I also learned rails just so I could build it).

I am definitely seeing the 'end' of the cap where I simply can't put more time into it. So far I have held up really well though, and I implement most of if not all the changes that people want to see (if I feel they are a good fit, that is).

But yes, my traffic is growing every day with more and more users, and adding new features is starting to get somewhat daunting as my code base grows.

As far as marketing, accounting, programming, etc I do it all, with the occasional help from a friend when it is too much.

Highly recommended though :) My site is my baby, and the goal when I made it wasnt to make lots of cash... it was to make a LARGE site that everyone uses. ever since I was a kid I wanted to create a massive site with thousands of users, and so far my dream has become a reality. it is a very good feeling.

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#12

Post by ronyeh »

I built a company that develops iOS apps. My most successful app so far is http://www.tinypiano.com/ with 6 million (free) downloads (launched Feb 2012). The app is monetizing via ads and in-app purchases.

I do this full time. My goal was to make an app that achieves 10 million downloads. It looks like it should hit that mark sometime this year. Another goal was to make enough money to buy a house. Assuming all goes well, that should be possible in a couple of years.

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#13

Post by mmackh »

I've built InstaPDF (http://instapdf.me) on my own. It consists of a web backend, written from scratch in PHP and a mobile client for iOS (native). A mac app is coming soon. Did the design too. I never worked in a team with more than one coder though, it would be great do to experience that sometime too.

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#14

Post by victorNicollet »

A website is not a start-up, and there's vastly more to a start-up than building the software.

I built the software for RunOrg (http://runorg.com) on my own --- private social networks for non-profits as a service --- but my co-founder's business development skills have been invaluable in getting our current 60k members.

As a side-effect, I also built and open-sourced a web framework for OCaml (http://ohm-framework.com).

I'm definitely feeling the stretch on my resources, though : there are so many feature requests and so little time to build everything I'd like to build.

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#16

Post by fomojola »

mmackh wrote: post #13

I've built InstaPDF ( http://instapdf.me ) on my own. It consists of a web backend, written from scratch in PHP and a mobile client for iOS (native). A mac app is coming soon. Did the design too. I never worked in a team with more than one coder though, it would be great do to experience that sometime too.

Site looks good. Small copy correction: "Amazon's Elastic Cloud 2" should be "Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud".

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#18

Post by coryl »

ronyeh wrote: post #12

I built a company that develops iOS apps. My most successful app so far is http://www.tinypiano.com/ with 6 million (free) downloads (launched Feb 2012). The app is monetizing via ads and in-app purchases. I do this full time. My goal was to make an app that achieves 10 million downloads. It looks like it should hit that mark sometime this year. Another goal was to make enough money to buy a house. Assuming all goes…

You mean buy a house in cash? Or afford a mortgage on your own?

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#19

Post by AlexanderZ »

http://feetlot.com - because buying shoes online is hard. The straw that broke the camel's back was when I ordered 2 different pairs of shoes in size 12. One fit like 11.5, the other like 12.5. Ha. That's when I decided to create a place where people can help each other with shoes' sizes.

Re: Ask HN: Solo startups? What have you built all on your own?

#20

Post by hackerboos »

TallboyOne wrote: post #11

I built http://pineapple.io all on my own in a matter of months (I also learned rails just so I could build it). I am definitely seeing the 'end' of the cap where I simply can't put more time into it. So far I have held up really well though, and I implement most of if not all the changes that people want to see (if I feel they are a good fit, that is). But yes, my traffic is growing every day with more and more user…

Can I ask how are you processing website screenshots on that page?
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