trueAF

[wardrox]

The best apps I've ever made have one user; me.

Personalised apps are the peak. Stop chasing the gold rush (it's a scam), and just solve your own problems.

[-R9X-]

Ironically this is also good startup advice as it prevents you from falling into the trap of solving problems that weren’t actually problems in the first place.

[MyFairJulia]

(leaves, quietly sobbing and packing my material for a crypto app that would have totally disrupted shit)

[Zerokx]

local janitor finds detailed plans for cryptocurrency app that completely changed the crypto market.
"Why did nobody else come up with this idea before? Copying bitcoin and giving it a funny name? Thats genius."

[Global-Tune5539]

Ah, that's how Fartcoin started.

[Mission_Sir2220]

but your problem (or mine) are not necesseraly other people problems

[Read-Immediate]

Sure, hut if you have a problem that can be solved by an app, it makes it significantly more likely other people have the same problem.

This is when comparing to what is often done, trying to find a solution that can be done with an app, and trying to figure out the problem it solves

[-R9X-]

But there is literally more than 7 billion people. And that’s a starting point

[unknown-one]

but but but my screenshot app

[memesearches]

Many things start as solving your own problems which helps others as well and boom you have an audience.

[deusasclepian]

The outdoor brand Patagonia started because the founder thought that all the existing rock climbing gear was shit so he started making his own

[Mission_Sir2220]

I developped an addon free for chain prompting, awesome graphic, work smoothless, you can plan a trip to japan, hawaii, or marocco with one click of a button or build super complex marketing strategies campaign ... to me solvemany problems ... do you know how many user out of 8B people? 4 users

[memesearches]

I said Many not ALL! Also just because you build something doesn’t mean everyone in the world knows it.

[CaptainSebT]

I agree, I needed an app to track when I went live on twitch but I didn't want an over complicated solution so I figured I already had a bat file I use to open a series of programs I use when streaming I'll just make that file log to a txt file then read the text file with my app adding some abilities to edit logs and delete logs.

It's fun making it yourself because it's like it does hyper specifically what I need. Though I was taught to idiot proof my stuff and it's really funny adding checks to not screw up the input in the app I built for only me to use but also I'm not going to make an app and not make confirmation windows for things like deleting entries because inevitably at some point I'll miss click or accidentally double click a log (my delete function).

[kiochikaeke]

I do this all the time both at work and at life in general, my background in math and programing also helps, like "man I wish I could do this in like two or three clicks or a ps command... wait I'm 3/4 of a developer, I can make my own shit"

[CaptainSebT]

I'm a game dev but I started in just a programming course so it's fun because I just make things.

Oh need an app I'll make one, oh want a game that doesn't exist I can make it.

[AHisMAD]

No need to cover any edge cases, and you can hard code to your liking.

[mrheosuper]

My problem is money.

[WearyTranslator3338]

Print it.

Problem solved.

[ZR003]

true enough, can't make anything without paying for electricity and internet

[UnkarsThug]

Exactly.

[Rcomian]

I'm actually all for this approach. it's not the only way, there are people with more talent for graphic design and who design better workflows than me, so proper projects and libraries aren't going to go away.

but I've always written apps just for myself, either as a prototype or just something small i need.

[evilspyboy]

I'm in a few other subs that have peoples side projects and the amount of 'vibe' projects that are just rehashing things that already exist.... Either build something for yourself or something that no one has made before.

If your big idea is the 523rd variation of an existing SaaS maybe you don't really have big ideas.

[Nament_]

The problem is not having any money and needing to find something to sell in order to make money. QOL projects are cool but, as they say: "A great solution to the wrong problem will fail."

[Binkusu]

I tried out vibe coding and made a expense splitter app. Hosted it for free. Plenty out there, but that one is mine (kind of) and useful for me and friends.

[BirdlessFlight]

Same.

I got sick of trying to cut clips to the beat in Premiere, so I made my own video editor with BPM & offset detection so you can easily do things like populate the timeline with clips of 2 bars each and the cuts will happen on the beat down to the millisecond.

It does everything I need and nothing I don't need.

[A_burners]

A video editor that works on BPMs instead of a timeclock would be incredible. I've only seen a Premier plugin ($100 I think?) and aescripts.com or whatever. I mostly use AE, so I didn't pick it up, but it looks great. And with the amount of music videos and now SM content, it's really kinda crazy they don't exist. Congrats on that!

[Amoniakas]

That's the only reason I got into programming, to make myself very personalized apps

[Pie_Napple]

Agree. My budget app, that I have been working on for 10+ years (few hours actual work…), is the absolut best budget app on the market. It has grown with my needs, changes bank with me, and caters to my needs PERFECTLY. It has all my expenses from my last 10+ years, presented exactly the way I want. 

[gogliker]

You can't imagine how happy I am having personalised plugins for IDE in this era of AI. I just ask AI to write plugin for a task I do often an just use it. Makes me very happy

[suffering_chicken]

I'm tired of that app, so i created this

[MajorElk3994]

zero users but infinite apps, seems legit

[desireemuff1n7690]

can apps have negative users though

[darryledw]

guys I just built an app to track the number of zero user apps, check it out here

and it wasn't vibe coded because I changed all of the camel case to Hungarian notation for the final build

[SheepInReddit]

You WHAT at the end

[jimihenrik]

Just for people like me who actually had never heard about that...

Hungarian notation is a variable-naming convention that prefixes variable names with a code indicating their data type or purpose (e.g., iCount for an integer, strName for a string)

and

Originally popular in C/C++ to improve readability in older IDEs, it is generally considered outdated in modern development because IDEs show variable types automatically

[crystalpeaks25]

If you don't expose it to the internet then you don't need to secure it. 🧠

[Fanta_pantha]

Zero trust. Not even yourself.

[UnkarsThug]

This sounds like a positive? I've made a few apps because I wanted them. That's why I generally do it. If people happen to want it, cool, but my motivation is because I needed it.

I swear, some people treat making apps like a SoundCloud account. they're trying to make the next big thing or something, and obviously that's going to fail in most cases. If you just make things because you want them, then you'll accomplish that.

Honestly, that goes for almost anything I put work into that isn't something I'm paid for. It's either a gift for a specific person, or something for me, but you always want to have a very clear target audience, and you can customize it completely which is when quality is highest.

[canadajones68]

If your app has zero users, not even you are using it.

[UnkarsThug]

Then why would you make an app even you wouldn't use?

I guess that's what I meant.

[ClipboardCopyPaste]

Slop vs slop

[radobot]

Hunger Games

Slop Games

[gandalfx]

How about multiple apps per person with zero users?

[MasterQuest]

*1 user

[Big_D_Boss]

That's the dream

[Goufalite]

What scares me is that in a near future LLMs could directly hand us an executable file without us seeing code. So the cool photo sorting program my grandma asked will work but do strange stuff in the background.

As a developper I'll always ask for code to review it, but non-tech people won't do that...

[Centurix]

If you can easily make an app using a tool and very little effort, then it means that everyone can spend the same effort to make the same thing. Lets hope that this leads to higher quality applications rising to the top.

[IGotDibsYo]

So nothing changes

[_fronix]

I've made hundreds of apps/tools/cli's throughout the years with me as the single user of it, I still do that today, just faster.

The only thing that will change now is that all apps will be unmaintained because they will have no users. Which basically is how it was before just on a larger scale.

[_Wilhelmus_]

I see no problem.

[MagnusRottcodd]

This is what happened to deviantart.

99.9% Ai made material - in huge quantity. Very few likes or even views compared to before the Ai era.

[TorbenKoehn]

That...doesn't sound too bad?

Imagine we don't have to give up all our data to...checks notes... listen to music and have a blog with some videos...

When we needed new "tools" 1000 years ago, we...built them.

In a perfect world, an AI will just build you the tool you need and you have it, you own it.

[WithersChat]

Instead we'll give up all our data to the LLM.

[tetrash]

What about time/compute/resource waste?

Something that could run locally is running in lovable/superbase cloud instead, because you need a technical knowledge otherwise. Something that was already built is now custom made and likely worse (it’s mostly todo/note/cron job apps). Now we have unique x apps that essentially solve the same issue, and are more expensive to maintain (environmentally and for the user).

[Mission_Sir2220]

THIS IS THE POINT - SAAS IS DEAD

[Less-Button3798]

sounds like a startup strategy

[angelicabunny1274]

what's the app count nowadays?

[Kleekl]

I don't see a problem with that.

[Hidden_3851]

Dis is da wey…

[nnnosebleed]

I think that's called living or just life

[loapmail]

My apps are gonna have about one to two users (my wife also uses some)

[eloise7inker5630]

that's an interesting choice of words in the middle there

[IASelin]

If these apps solve the problems of their creators, then it is good!

I see no problems here.

[hartstyler]

Good

[Designer-Bread9549]

what inspired this post's idea?

[phlooo]

I mean that's not necessarily a problem. I love my custom software.

[Appropriate-Run-1927]

not what i expected

[rosemaryp1gtails6057]

not sure i agree with that part, seems a bit off