This month was a fun one in my entrepreneurship journey. I intentionally ran into a speed bump, and it counted as “working” — that’s a new one for me. The stunt was performed for this site’s landing page and cost a whooping 5,74€.
The app I’m building takes inspiration from speed bumps. You know, these fuckers:
They are annoying, but together with speed radars, they're the only method to actually slow a car down. That’s the idea with SpeedBump, an app to use addictive apps like social media less. It’s for when gentle reminders don’t work anymore.
Regardless of whether you’ve used the app, it’d be super helpful to learn about your phone usage in this survey. SpeedBump's early release is now public on the Play Store. For the iOS version, I first had to buy a MacBook. Now that I've thrown my wallet at the fruit company, I’m hoping it will be ready in a few weeks. You can subscribe to the waitlist here.
Exploring and learning have been great. Or rather than learning, contemplating the endless pile of skills that I need. Programming is by far the easiest, especially with AI. Don't get me wrong, Android development is a huuuge pain. But I was able to submit a (very rough) alpha version to the Play Store after only 4 days. Since then, I’ve been squashing bugs, finding new ones, and squashing them again.
The hardest part has been shutting off programmer mode: looking at some ugly code and convincing myself that it’s okay. Why would I clean it up if users might not like the feature anyway? But how do I know if users like the feature? Where can I find users in the first place? Is my idea wrong? What is the meaning of life?
To prove the point that ugly code is okay for now, I’ve written this website in the most basic way: plain HTML and CSS. For those unfamiliar, it’s like delivering mail via carrier pigeon in the age of email. And the pigeon is sick and needs to go walking. With a walking stick.
User experience is another tough nut to crack. To onboard SpeedBump, you need to grant access to a couple of permissions on your phone. It’s already my fifth iteration of this single screen, and some still don't understand it. If the interface is good enough, users shouldn’t even need to think what they need to do — it should be obvious. This brilliant quote describes the situation better than I can:
Simplicity doesn’t mean being crude. True simplicity often requires a deep understanding of complexity, seeing the big picture and identifying key points or abstracting commonalities. Simplicity is not easy.
The feedback I’ve received has made me prioritize making it possible to "take a break" and having more annoyances. People sometimes do want to use Instagram or TikTok. And only having 5 annoyances can get boring quick.
But above all lies the challenge of the challenges. What’s yet to be proven is whether I can actually earn a living. No big deal (it is).