andersthue

I agree that the term shareware is dead, but time limited or feature limited freeware with a paid full version is not dead.

I make a living from http://www.watermark-image.com and other sw for windows, I have et a lot of people at MicroConf who makes a living from sw.

Just to pitch in at the last minute :)

I could make a living from my windows installable watermarking software http://www.watermark-image.com (I am kinda, I also run a consultancy and is bootstrapping http://timeblock.com with the reveneu from those two business)

I have been working on it for five years and 5x the revenue after attending MicroConf in europe 2 years ago.

Currently I work on the software and do supports 5-10 hours a month making $4-5k i could probably grow it some more, but is using my energy on TimeBlock.

I like the idea as a help to people desperate in need if a job.

My question is; if and how would you make a buck? People looking for that kind of job usually don't have any money to spare?

As a free service to immegrants it would be nice, and you could learn a ton building the site.

I do not belive I or any other can answer with a in depth answer to such a broad question.

It depends too much on price range, customer base, value created, etc.

With my SaaS App and method called TimeBlock I have a user price of $49, at an average user count of around 10 I do not need to contact more than a few new leads a day to grow the business.

I have around a 50% conversion rate from lead to "using the method" in some way, currently my sample base is not big enough to know the conversion rate to paying customer.

Read more about TimeBlock here: http://timeblock.com

In my consultancy we struggled for many years with these issues which led to poor performance and low revenue/profit and missed deadlines.

For the last couple of years we have tried many different things to boost productivity, inspired by netflix, valve, linkedin and more.

This year all these things resulted in us inventing a new method (http://timeblock.com) that is more about transparency and feedback between Makers and Managers than anything else.

The method results in less procrastination, better estimation, happier Makers, Managers and customers.

The only bad programmers I know are those who over promise and under delivers.

If a programmer week after week on project after project says he will do x, y and z and next week he did G then it ruins the team because nobody knows what to believe and what to count on.

Have you tried out Trello, it could be the best tool for you if you are needing a fast and easy kaizan system to organize your information.

If you are looking for a way to organize the development of your product while being sure that the team is connected and communicates about who are doing what and when then my startup TimeBlock and the app we are building might help you as much as it has helped my consultancy and the 10+ customers already onboard.

It's a methodology that is based on kaizan, scrum, taoism and other input from entreprenuers and customers, the main objective of the method is to help the Makers, Managers and Customers be a little more happy in their daily lives.

Read more at http://timeblock.com or email me at anders@timeblock.com

I do not see .co as strong as .com - that is why I went for the .com domain I wrote about below - even though I did buy some other domains as .io and .net before the deal was finalized.

There is something about a .com that signals age and trust more than any other domains, I invariably think that it must be a new business or not as trustworthy when they don't own the .com (especially if the .com is for sale)

I bought http://timeblock.com for $2k, it was parked and had a price tag at $6k.

I really wanted the name since we had named the startup so 2k was "cheap" even though it was a lot of money for us.

Luckily I had just read the post on how easypost bought their domain and replicated that with success.

Have your read "lean startup", by Eric Rise?

I would never run multiple startups, but I think you could do the initial research to see which idea has any real chance of succes by following the method laid out in the book!

Happiness!

I want to make people happier, that is my "why" and in every decision I make I investigate whether it makes me, an employee or a customer happier.

I dream of making every Maker and Manager out there a little bit happier and believe I have the tool in my TimeBlock method.

"The root of all our problems is our inability to let go", Leo Babauta in the free "Letting go book" http://zenhabits.net/lg/

So if that holds true, you might be holding on to a statement like "my poor english makes people think I am less of a person" - but if you try to investigate that statement you might discover that the world is full of people speaking poorly english that is not a lessor person.

Try see what internal beliefs that your are holding on to, often these belief is not true when examined, and if you let go of these beliefs you also let go of your self doubt.

Doing a startup wether a bootstrapped or vc funded is one long series of validation excersises mixed with the eventual app crashes and data loss that spice up your life.

Getting any users validates that they find it interesting enough to sign up, then you must validate more by looking at their interactions, if they are using the app you have done one more validation.

My recommendation is that you get one or more mentors who have done one or more startup and also get into a mastermind group, check out https://mastermindjam.com for help on that.

I met my co-founders at school, after 11 years I finally figured out it did not work and that it never would work, been a single founder for the last 6 years and is never going to have a co-founder again.

Remember some people work better as single founders.

Ps. I have employees and always will, I loce being around people at work.

In Denmark you are protected/seen as an employee after 12 months of freelancing if you mainly work for one company.

It's the "letting go ebook" from Leo Babauta : http://zenhabits.net/lg/

Did not start a company while starting a family but I did restart my business.

When I got my (now 7 year old) daughter, I realised that what I was doing was not right for me, I sold the company for "nothing" and rebuild a consultancy, I had the good luck of earning enough to get by from day one from some old clients.

Your welcome, and yes it is nice and gratifying (and quite a bit scary) to have invented something that people start using after 45 minutes introduction.

In the beginning I thought it had to be a fluke, so I tested it more and more, pushing then envelope and finally asking customers to pay for a beta product.

They said "ok", which was even scarier, because now we had to deliver!

I found the problem when I stopped looking for it - I have been reading the zenhabits "letting go" book many times (six at last count) and part of finding something worthwhile to work on was stopping to search for "the thing"(tm) and start looking at what was around me.

When you stop forcing yourself to get an idea and start looking with an open mind and open eye you start noticing stuff that others do not, and perhaps you might even discover something that is right for you to spend some time on

Try letting go of what is "the best" (tm) thing to do and do what makes most sense - what delivers most value to your customer is probably a name that is easy to spell and remember after your customer has seen or heard about it.

Perhaps test it with a few, asking them to write down your domain/brand name to see if you got it or not?

I got the idea to http://timeblock.com without knowing it :)

January 5th this year I did another adjustment to how we worked in my consultancy. Another bc. I have been trying all kind of stuff for many years, leaning on NetFlix, Valve software and many others who are trying to remove management, control and rules.

After three weeks I noticed I had started to sleep better than I had since I started my business in 1998. I told my accountant about what I was doing now and he was very excited, this made me think that I better tell some more about this.

The next company I told about the TimeBlock method switched to it within 36 hours, this made me realize that I was onto something. I then used a month to talk to potential users until I was sure that I had something. This something is TimeBlock.

Uhm, I do not understand what you mean by hijacking scrolling? Could you elaborate, perhaps on email anders at timeblock.com

We are currently at $392/month from 3 customers who has signed on as early bird users on the TimeBlock method, we wrote the first line of code mid march, after 1 month of interviews with potential customers.

Besides being a tool to do project management easier than in trello, it is primarily a new methodology that helps Makers and Managers understand their differences and their needs.

The method helps Makers be in flow by teaching Managers to leave them alone, help minimize procrastination by helping Makers divide projects and plan their week, thereby increasing their internal motivation.

Sign up for our launch list and read more at http://timeblock.com

Edit: Changed the number, signed on a new customer :)

Thank you all for great pointers on what and how I best can help my nephew.

I have offered him my assistance and I hope he will take it, I will try to limit what i do and maximize the learning of how it is ok to fail and that it takes a lot of time to learn new stuff.

Hopefully he will be able to build something that will make him proud.

Thanks for the feedback.

It is not the first time he has shown interest in doing something with his computer more than playing.

I understand the importance of him being motivated and doing something he can share with his friend, I will only act as a helping hand when he asks for help, it is not my project (I got my own kid who is my project;)

But thanks for the reminder!

Thanks, lot of good advice and takeaways - I think the low abstraction and drag/drop is a good teaser, also some of it is in Danish, that will help the initial learning curve being small.

He has an ipad so this might be better than something requiring him to boot his pc.

He has played a lot of minecraft but has not shown interest in modding.

Looks interesting and more challenging than scratch- I remember a drag and drop game tool on the c64 that never really caught me, but I think my nephew needs something that quickly gives him results- then he can learn to tame the instant gratification monkey later:)

Scratch looks interesting, although it requires flash.

Will take a look when I have access to a winbox.

A new methodology, agile/scrum but more humane.

Been an IT developer for most of my life but always found humans and how they work more interesting than computers and finally I figured out how to do something good with that interest.

http://timeblock.com