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> Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. You seem to be talking about the typical solo entrepreneur story where someone t

> Usually it becomes a business that requires constant attention as it scales. You seem to be talking about the typical solo entrepreneur story where someone tries to guess at a consumer product, makes it on their own time, then tries to sell it? No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Give them a license not full rights. Now you can sell it again. It still takes work to sell, and work to deliver on each sale. Just less than the first time. And you can ask more since you have a demo. To make early-retirement money it still takes being in the right place at the right time, recognizing that, and setting a high price you can get. The point is the system isn't rigged to the point where heads you lose and tails someone else wins. It's in your hands. I certainly wasn't thinking of apps either way. I am only familiar with b2b markets requiring specialized skills (where I'd think contracting is most lucrative anyway).

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Great in theory, rare in practice. Usually when someone reaches the point where the code they’re writing for a company is self-contained and re-usable by other companies, they’re building a product rather than writing code. Not strictly an app, but it’s still a product that must be maintained, supported, and sold. I’ve hired many contractors and contracting companies to build code, features, or even products over the years. I can’t imagine a scenario where I’d willingly give any of them a license to maintain ownership of what I’m paying them to write and, even worse, a license to resell it to companies that are likely to be my competitors.
- unishark 5y ago
  It's not rare at all. Any field where the company or person paying for the code has absolutely no ability to do anything with it themselves anyway. And frankly people tend to keep and reuse their code anyway, but I prefer to be honest about it. Here's an example I did: fast linear algebra algorithms in C to run an algorithm on a customer's device. They wanted the high level algo working, not my matrix code. I used it in other stuff for a really long time. One doesn't need everyone in the world to unanimously agree to one's license terms. It's fine if you're repulsed by the idea. That's a important flag when considering potential customers.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

> No, I was talking about contractors keeping ownership of the code, for example, that people are paying them to make under contract. Great in theory, rare in practice. Usually when someone reaches the point where the code they’re writing for a company is self-contained and re-usable by other companies, they’re building a product rather than writing code. Not strictly an app, but it’s still a product that must be maintained, supported, and sold. I’ve hired many contractors and contracting companies to build code, features, or even products over the years. I can’t imagine a scenario where I’d willingly give any of them a license to maintain ownership of what I’m paying them to write and, even worse, a license to resell it to companies that are likely to be my competitors.

unishark 5y ago
It's not rare at all. Any field where the company or person paying for the code has absolutely no ability to do anything with it themselves anyway. And frankly people tend to keep and reuse their code anyway, but I prefer to be honest about it. Here's an example I did: fast linear algebra algorithms in C to run an algorithm on a customer's device. They wanted the high level algo working, not my matrix code. I used it in other stuff for a really long time. One doesn't need everyone in the world to unanimously agree to one's license terms. It's fine if you're repulsed by the idea. That's a important flag when considering potential customers.