Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Five years of indie hacking

allisonseboldt.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 76 posts

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#31

Post by Scubabear68 »

I honestly found the article rather confusing. Maybe it’s the terminology used? When I hear the term “indie hacking”, I don’t think of product building (although author’s link has that as a definition). Going into the post I thought I’d read about some person’s five year journey into some wonderfully whacky personal hacking projects. The post seemed to start that way.

But then half way through, the tone changes to talk about product and business and learning all that commercial stuff.

The story ends talking about the projects only generating minimal revenue, and disappointment stemming from that.

I am far from an expert in this, but what seems to be lacking is clear cut goals from the start on the business side. If the goal is to hack, then the code itself is the reward. If the goal is to start a business, then you need targets (users, revenue, profitability, growth, etc) and plans (product vision, marketing strategy, market research, etc).

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#32

Post by TheRoque »

Scubabear68 wrote: post #31

I honestly found the article rather confusing. Maybe it’s the terminology used? When I hear the term “indie hacking”, I don’t think of product building (although author’s link has that as a definition). Going into the post I thought I’d read about some person’s five year journey into some wonderfully whacky personal hacking projects. The post seemed to start that way. But then half way through, the tone changes to ta…

Well, the term "indie hacker" means starting a business yeah. The difference with just "starting a business" is that the mindset is most of the time to build a small scale project that can be built and maintained alone.

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#33

Post by _jpys »

pengwing wrote: post #30
margorczynski wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Get RICH in the A.I. Revolution (2023) > Get RICH With These 24 Investing Rules Looks like your typical get-rich-fast Youtube financebro selling you his "ultra-limited now just $500" course on starting a business. Yep, on his website is some super-special course.

The wording of a video title is determined by the rules of copywriting. You try to maximize clicks and gain virality. There is no correlation to the quality of the content. In terms of website, I am not sure what you are referring to: acquisition.com is the actual website, that is dedicated to buying businesses. There is no paid course, all content is free. Technically the e-book costs 99 cents.

"You try to maximize clicks and gain virality. There is no correlation to the quality of the content."

Really?

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#34

Post by ptero »

One idea for folks trying to bootstrap an indie hacking project as a cure for megacorp blues is to work for a year in a small startup.

That way you can get some exposure to non-software tasks you will have to handle and will be able to move faster when bootstrapping your own. My 2c.

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#35

Post by Scubabear68 »

TheRoque wrote: post #32
Scubabear68 wrote: post #31

I honestly found the article rather confusing. Maybe it’s the terminology used? When I hear the term “indie hacking”, I don’t think of product building (although author’s link has that as a definition). Going into the post I thought I’d read about some person’s five year journey into some wonderfully whacky personal hacking projects. The post seemed to start that way. But then half way through, the tone changes to ta…

Well, the term "indie hacker" means starting a business yeah. The difference with just "starting a business" is that the mindset is most of the time to build a small scale project that can be built and maintained alone.

I must be out of touch, I didn't know it was an established phrase to mean that. Thanks.

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#36

Post by cdiamand »

loveparade wrote: post #18

> With the launch of my second business last July (a programmatic SEO tool called PageFactory Great read, but it's a bit disappointing to see that the author was only able to make money with yet another SEO spam tool to generate low-quality content. The idea of the original Fantasy Congress was much more interesting, too bad that didn't work out.

To me, that's actually one of the most optimistic parts. The author is willing to build what markets want, not a passion project, which is a turning point.

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#37

Post by UncleEntity »

xupybd wrote: post #20

I'm interested in the author's latest SAAS. Can you really game SEO by spamming out templated articles? I thought Google filtered out that sort of thing.

Maybe that’s why you give it a spreadsheet of fill-in-the-blank answers so all the articles are ‘unique’?

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#38

Post by Shindi »

ptero wrote: post #34

One idea for folks trying to bootstrap an indie hacking project as a cure for megacorp blues is to work for a year in a small startup. That way you can get some exposure to non-software tasks you will have to handle and will be able to move faster when bootstrapping your own. My 2c.

This. If the idea of doing sales or marketing at a small startup turns you off, don't become an indie hacker because that is your main job - to promote what you've made.

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#39

Post by davnicwil »

Scubabear68 wrote: post #35
TheRoque wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the term "indie hacker" means starting a business yeah. The difference with just "starting a business" is that the mindset is most of the time to build a small scale project that can be built and maintained alone.

I must be out of touch, I didn't know it was an established phrase to mean that. Thanks.

Not actually sure which came first, this site or the term, but indiehackers.com [0] is one of the main internet communities built around this.

[0] https://www.indiehackers.com/

Re: Five years of indie hacking

#40

Post by antegamisou »

Scubabear68 wrote: post #35
TheRoque wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the term "indie hacker" means starting a business yeah. The difference with just "starting a business" is that the mindset is most of the time to build a small scale project that can be built and maintained alone.

I must be out of touch, I didn't know it was an established phrase to mean that. Thanks.

The term has been very much abused by SV grifters unfortunately. I've written about this before:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33536247

Post reply on HN