Day 418 - Don't support indie hacker products - https://golifelog.com/posts/dont-support-indie-hacker-products-1645498546586
Rant incoming:
Don’t support indie hacker products.
Especially if you prefer stability.
Especially if you hate it when features break.
Especially if you want your tools to be dependable.
Being an indie hacker myself, my first reflex is to support my peers. Most of the time, it’s a good decision. You get up close to a product as an early adopter and it’s development journey, and you’re rooting for the underdog founder to succeed, which by extension, I’m also rooting for myself. It’s a mutually enabling relationship.
But as a consumer, f**k does it annoy me when:
- Maker launches with a big show, makes grand promises about how the product is his/her “life’s work” (when he’s just 20), and then disappears later due to burnout, personal problems, or lack of interest
- Maker gets acquired/sells out to a competitor. Shortly after, the acquirer announces that they will stop development for the product, and they can sign up for the other product instead. It ended up being an acquisition to kill competition, and leaves the community in the lurch.
- Maker keeps developing the product – a good sign initially, and over time makes the product increasingly worse. Product gets unstable, and even basic features stop working, while new features are non-starters and white elephants.
- Maker rebrands product multiple times and with each time it further alienates the community from original spirit that you had signed up for. Rebrands mostly achieves nothing but it’s next level to create larger and larger rifts between your community and the product.
These complaints isn’t just from one product or maker but based on many I had tried over the years. And it’s happening often enough for it to not be a fluke or outlier.
F**k this, I’m going for enterprise products the next time.
/rant
Don’t support indie hacker products.
Especially if you prefer stability.
Especially if you hate it when features break.
Especially if you want your tools to be dependable.
Being an indie hacker myself, my first reflex is to support my peers. Most of the time, it’s a good decision. You get up close to a product as an early adopter and it’s development journey, and you’re rooting for the underdog founder to succeed, which by extension, I’m also rooting for myself. It’s a mutually enabling relationship.
But as a consumer, f**k does it annoy me when:
- Maker launches with a big show, makes grand promises about how the product is his/her “life’s work” (when he’s just 20), and then disappears later due to burnout, personal problems, or lack of interest
- Maker gets acquired/sells out to a competitor. Shortly after, the acquirer announces that they will stop development for the product, and they can sign up for the other product instead. It ended up being an acquisition to kill competition, and leaves the community in the lurch.
- Maker keeps developing the product – a good sign initially, and over time makes the product increasingly worse. Product gets unstable, and even basic features stop working, while new features are non-starters and white elephants.
- Maker rebrands product multiple times and with each time it further alienates the community from original spirit that you had signed up for. Rebrands mostly achieves nothing but it’s next level to create larger and larger rifts between your community and the product.
These complaints isn’t just from one product or maker but based on many I had tried over the years. And it’s happening often enough for it to not be a fluke or outlier.
F**k this, I’m going for enterprise products the next time.
/rant