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I upvoted, and you're not the first to suggest this either. But I must argue that to have 3 or 4 well-ranked apps with a solid income is easier said than done,

I upvoted, and you're not the first to suggest this either. But I must argue that to have 3 or 4 well-ranked apps with a solid income is easier said than done, especially for a single developer. I wish I had the insight to know exactly what 3 or 4 other apps to write so I can have a steady income. But chances are by the time I finish writing 3 good apps a year from now, I'll be lucky if one of them has as much traction as this one. The other choice would be to take this app that already has traction (from only my part time work) and pour more time an energy into it to see how big it could really get. Thoughts?

shareme 16y ago
I am facing the exact same decision set in many respects. 1. I have one good app in dev process in a market segment that is hot, Custom HomeScreens 2. I know that I need some more apps, was thinking some quick 2d games via using andengine. 3. I do have some fulltime inquiries that might work as base income to fund the full 12 month weekend-evening dev cycle. Pull Tim Bray's recent blog posts on making money in the android market. There also was some recent HN articles on android dev's making $120,000 yearly with a paired free and paid approach. BTW, what dev processes are you using thus far? I am switching to combination TDD and BDD approach using robolectric and robotium/android-mock to take some of the pain out.
- riledhel 16y ago
  this blog post? http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2011/02/26/Mobile-Money http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2011/02/26/Mobile-Mon...
  - shareme 16y ago
    that is one of them and he has some more in fact..
- makeramen 16y ago
  Dev process? I do what I think my app needs. It's rather 37signals-esque. I was the original user, and that's just how it's grown, other people happened to like it. I only take on other peoples suggested features when they align with what I want out of the app, or when the screaming and yelling from my users gets unbearable. I have no tolerance for bugs, bullshit, or shitty customer support. Emails are answered within a day but usually hours, sometimes bugfixes even come out in less than an hour. I don't unit test, I just write good code ;) Seriously, none of the bugs I've encountered were really unit-testable, so I don't really bother.
jranck 16y ago
Use the traction you've already got in the productivity category with this app to tackle other problems in that area. Be the next 37signals of the Android marketplace.

shareme 16y ago

I am facing the exact same decision set in many respects. 1. I have one good app in dev process in a market segment that is hot, Custom HomeScreens 2. I know that I need some more apps, was thinking some quick 2d games via using andengine. 3. I do have some fulltime inquiries that might work as base income to fund the full 12 month weekend-evening dev cycle. Pull Tim Bray's recent blog posts on making money in the android market. There also was some recent HN articles on android dev's making $120,000 yearly with a paired free and paid approach. BTW, what dev processes are you using thus far? I am switching to combination TDD and BDD approach using robolectric and robotium/android-mock to take some of the pain out.

riledhel 16y ago
this blog post? http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2011/02/26/Mobile-Money http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2011/02/26/Mobile-Mon...
- shareme 16y ago
  that is one of them and he has some more in fact..
makeramen 16y ago
Dev process? I do what I think my app needs. It's rather 37signals-esque. I was the original user, and that's just how it's grown, other people happened to like it. I only take on other peoples suggested features when they align with what I want out of the app, or when the screaming and yelling from my users gets unbearable. I have no tolerance for bugs, bullshit, or shitty customer support. Emails are answered within a day but usually hours, sometimes bugfixes even come out in less than an hour. I don't unit test, I just write good code ;) Seriously, none of the bugs I've encountered were really unit-testable, so I don't really bother.

jranck 16y ago

Use the traction you've already got in the productivity category with this app to tackle other problems in that area. Be the next 37signals of the Android marketplace.