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Does “building in public” work?

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Re: Does “building in public” work?

#211

Post by whydoesitbugu »

TechDebtDevin wrote: post #112
winwang wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently a technical solo founder. Got any video recs?

The SaaS Podcast by Omer Khan has some solid technical interviews including lots on growth and matketing with solo devs and small teams who are actually serious and not just grifting and wrapping apis with no-code solutions. The World Of DaaS by Auren Hoffman has some decent episodes. These tend to be interviews with more established entrepreneurs but lots of bootstrapping/ early growth stories from devs/teams when t…

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Re: Does “building in public” work?

#212

Post by colecut »

TechDebtDevin wrote: post #12
pembrook wrote: post #10

Anecdotal, but it seems like all the people who “build in public” end up trapped by their chosen distribution strategy. What I mean by this is, if you’re building in public there’s a 99% chance you’re going to end up building products for other indiehackers who are interested in following people who build in public. This means you’re probably going to end up building yet another micro-Saas dev tool (Saas boilerplate,…

This. I like listening to technical solo founders talk about they built. Its the less technical marketing guys building in public their AI "powered" crud apps or micro SaaS like you describe that really bother me. They remind me a lot of scammy people on Instagram talking about drop shipping or whatever the get rich quick scheme of the week is.

That seems a bit harsh. They aren't forcing anyone to watch or scamming anyone by building in public.

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#213

Post by p0nce »

whiterknight wrote: post #7

When it comes to marketing I think we can take a page from the Apple playbook. Never show anything incomplete. Critics and the general public don’t understand the artistic process and will only become uneasy. nobody cares how you did it. Just show results.

Yes I feel like this "public" work only for non-veblen goods, else it just devaluates the whole creation process.

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#214

Post by lioeters »

citizenpaul wrote: post #143

Wow, I looked at that buildinpublic hashtag and got serious stock market trader forum energy feeling from the posts. Yea people are doing work but its the same kinda thing where the stock people will post a 3000 word write up everyday about their market thoughts but are still not really doing anything. Its like energy looking for a place to be used but in the meantime why not run in place till we drop? I guess this i…

> Its like energy looking for a place to be used but in the meantime why not run in place till we drop?

Reminds me of the crypto space during the peak of its hype, where people wrote a flood of articles and software, attracting attention, claiming to be important and world-changing. Yet a year or two later, have evaporated into much ado about nothing. I'm not discounting the possibility that some of it will eventually become popular and practical, but there was sure a lot of smoke and mirrors.

The Hustle - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_o7qjN3KF8U

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#215

Post by wheatgreaser »

CM30 wrote: post #47
pembrook wrote: post #10

Anecdotal, but it seems like all the people who “build in public” end up trapped by their chosen distribution strategy. What I mean by this is, if you’re building in public there’s a 99% chance you’re going to end up building products for other indiehackers who are interested in following people who build in public. This means you’re probably going to end up building yet another micro-Saas dev tool (Saas boilerplate,…

This is an issue with a lot of online creator communities and people using them for marketing too. Way too many would be authors, artists, game developers, YouTubers, musicians, etc end up marketing their work in communities for their choice of art/project rather than in places their actual audience visits. Unfortunately as you point out, while that can work to a limited degree, it will usually cap off pretty quickly…

is there like a right way to do it?

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#216

Post by _heimdall »

oceanplexian wrote: post #56
zaptrem wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's another very large subgroup you're missing: the hackers that build things (even for $0) because they're fun/cool, not because they solve a specific annoying problem/inefficiency.

That’s not hacking, that’s called a hobby. Hacking is something that challenges social norms or might even get you in trouble.

Hacking seems to have taken on so many different meanings.

I've always known hacking as a term specifically related to bypassing security in digital systems. Think Matthew Broderick gaining access to government networks via a phone line. This was hacking that would always get you in trouble if caught.

I'm not quite sure when "hacking" was repurposed as a term for using something in a way it wasn't intended ("life hacks" or "kitchen hacks", etc).

Now hacking is about challenging social norms? I'm very lost at this point, in an "old man shakes fist at clouds" kind of way.

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#219

Post by moneywoes »

TechDebtDevin wrote: post #12
pembrook wrote: post #10

Anecdotal, but it seems like all the people who “build in public” end up trapped by their chosen distribution strategy. What I mean by this is, if you’re building in public there’s a 99% chance you’re going to end up building products for other indiehackers who are interested in following people who build in public. This means you’re probably going to end up building yet another micro-Saas dev tool (Saas boilerplate,…

This. I like listening to technical solo founders talk about they built. Its the less technical marketing guys building in public their AI "powered" crud apps or micro SaaS like you describe that really bother me. They remind me a lot of scammy people on Instagram talking about drop shipping or whatever the get rich quick scheme of the week is.

do you have any examples?

Re: Does “building in public” work?

#220

Post by YounesDz »

marcosdumay wrote: post #87
andyjohnson0 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I mean by this is, if you’re building in public there’s a 99% chance you’re going to end up building products for other indiehackers who are interested in following people who build in public. Sounds a bit like a variation on Conway's Law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law

There must be some named law that states that the set of people you listen determine most of your thoughts. But it's something way wider in scope than Conway's Law. There are some proverbs, because it's a very old observation. But there must be named laws too, because it's a very common observation.

Rob Hardy wrote about this phenomenon (it's not exclusive to indie hackers) and he call it "the pattern":

> If you’ve ever wondered why so much of the creator economy looks like a pyramid scheme—with course creators who teach other creators how to sell courses to creators who eventually sell their own courses on course creation to other unsuspecting creators—mimesis is at the heart of the matter.

From his article: The Ungated Manifesto: The Pattern, and the Battle for the Soul of the Internet.

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