5 ms·

At 5.99 monthly that's $239.60/month, which seems low after 12 month product build + 6month post launch...

• Bootwizard 7y ago
  Low compared to what? If he's making more than his operating costs, it's not low. I'd love to make an extra $240 a month.
  • mattcdrake 7y ago
    The implication is that 18 months of development has an opportunity cost associated with it, even if OP spent no money.
    • michaelscott 7y ago
      If there's not much maintenance, low operating costs and a loyal customer base (or just a straight $200/month, let's say) the lifetime of that income may make up for that 18 months even in opportunity cost. Tough to know without a longer timeframe.
  • HenryBemis 7y ago
    > Low compared to... "I worked on this project during my free time (weekends, evenings, holidays) for approximately 12 months, from April 2018 to March 2019." If by "free time" the author means 1h per working day and 4 per day on weekends, that would be ~680h -> 85 days (8h per day)(back to back). Not that's not a good ROI at least for me. I won't count the deeply unique value of "time not spent with family/friends/children". I sincerely hope that this picks up and gets 4000 paying customers, but so far for a year's worth of work it's not impressive.
    • RobertRoberts 7y ago
      A lot of people don't have family (at all, or perhaps near enough to spend time with). Also, young people's time has a different value from an older married with kids people's time. (most young people I know spend tons of time on youtube, yik yak (zip zap? or whatever it's called), playbox x-one things, etc...)
      • ClumsyPilot 7y ago
        Yes, people spend their time to have a life. If that's YouTube, so be it. What matters is that their time is worth at least minimum wage, probably more if you are a skilled professional. So saying 'I did it for $0' is not useful. Example: I could spend a week learning carpentry and build a dinner table, or I could buy it from IKEA for $40. That's a dumb move for most people, unless I am super interested in carpentry.
        • RobertRoberts 7y ago
          > ... saying 'I did it for $0' is not useful. He spent time, not money. His statement is accurate. Edit: It's a subjective point of view to say it's not "useful". I found it helpful to see what he did.
    • wazanator 7y ago
      They spent their time working on a project that they enjoyed, successfully completed, and ended up with 40 customers. I would not call that a waste of time at all. Even if it dies off in 6 months it's a great learning experience and the kind of thing that's great to talk about with a hiring manager.
      • jlengrand 7y ago
        And that's without counting the level 2 / 3 benefits. Hard to measure, but one of his customers or people having read that blog might offer him a good job one day, or start something with him/her. All time spent can't just be measured straight in money / hour can it. In any case, if he's happy and proud of his project that's the worse I wish him
    • johnsimer 7y ago
      For a year's worth of work IMO it's still impressive I have tons of side projects I've spent months on that never made a dollar
  • mattmaroon 7y ago
    Low compared to working at Walmart which would probably have paid much more.
• idunno246 7y ago
  It mentions partnerships with a discount and rev share generates a lot of sales, so probably even lower than that But it was also twelve months of side project time, not full time
• allie1 7y ago
  Not necessarily (if most of those 40 came from 1 source, and it's a traffic source that can be expanded upon). Wonder if that was the case here?
• HenryBemis 7y ago
  Count VAT, tax, and other costs 170(?) per month. At this scale it is better to deliver pizzas. As I wrote on another comment I sincerely wish that it grows to 4000, so it becomes a proper income.
  • thrownaway954 7y ago
    WRONG!!! Cause delivering pizzas means YOU have to deliver the pizzas. The site makes money while the dude is sleeping and at his day job. You can't do that and deliver pizzas.
    • ivalm 7y ago
      Sure, but he already spent probably ~500 hours. At $100/hour (assuming competent but not FANG dev in CA) that's $50k worth of labor. If he nets $200/months he would need 250months ~ 20 years. My point is, if he did it for fun it's a success (he got a nice product, yay!), but it's not a financial success.
• thorwasdfasdf 7y ago
  240$/month is a heck of a lot better than most indie projects.
  • mrieck 7y ago
    That's what I was thinking about my project. Only took me 8 years (on the side) to make a cartoon maker/meme editor that exports to MP4 and I get paid $0 for it and have no traffic: https://www.superanimo.com https://www.superanimo.com
    • thorwasdfasdf 7y ago
      This looks cool and might have potential for creative types. Unfortunately most people aren't that creative. But, have you tried contacting UTubers that do these types of animes? I'd imagine they'd be super interested in it. sometimes even mainstream Utubers use short animations to highlight certain things or use arrow animations in their presentations. From what I hear, editing takes a super long time and is a big pain point for them. It might be worth sitting down with them over skype to discuss it with them and figure out how your product or one similar to it could help them.