Haha, so true. Similar to why writers write, painters paint, or musicians make music. Only, we're lucky in that there are more lucrative, and available, jobs for our skills.
Being a developer is a free pass to create solutions literally to any field that exists and the best part of it is that while building cool stuff (or boring stuff, sometimes) we can get more experience and evolve. Think of it: we can learn and improve what we can deliver just by creating stuff. Randomly. Everyday.
Being a developer is a choice to be free, especially if you are an indie hacker.
Having tools in place to make things as per own will irrespective of location or huge setup is rare, most of the profession require particular environment/setup or tools to do the job and requires others contribution
Doctor can’t practice at home or do WFH
It’s hard to make films by one person without crew.
Pilots can’t fly aeroplane in close room
But software developer can turn their imagination into reality with minimum resources without depending on other person. It’s possible for software developer to work on many projects, still do the daily job.
There are other really interesting part of developers side hustling already explained in this article I agreed to are learning, curiosity to make something and to get money out of it. 👍🏻
Yeah, it can seem a little bit nuts when you take a step back and look at it. When I my non-engineering friends ask me what my hobbies are, I'm like... "I go home and code."
"So... you work 8 hours a day coding, then you code some more on the weekend for fun...?"
I think most developers build their own side projects because they are scratching their own itch. Most of my products have been tools I've needed, and I built them to solve a problem I am facing. A side benefit is figuring out how to get others to use your product and hopefully pay for it.
I know for me personally, I love building things from scratch. Coding and building side projects is a creative outlet for me. Also in a lot of cases, programmers might not be working on something they're really passionate about in their day job so working on a side project is an opportunity to work on something they're more emotionally invested in.
Just anecdotal rambling:
I had a side project once building a chrome extension which solved a pain for at its best time 2k users. It wasn’t very lucrative but i made about 300 bucks in donations along the line.
The joy i had working on this, directly interacting with my users releasing updates / features. And supporting them in onboarding my tool - it was the reason i made software my bread and butter.
Never got this joy from any commercial project / dayjob and am still in pursuit of regaining this.
what kind of products would you enjoy building? meaning- would you enjoy building products that help people in the tech industry, products that help devs build better products, products for the healthtech industry,ed tech etc.
I'd be interested in discussing software architecture framework for products that we're building.
IMO developers have this amazing opportunity (if leveraged correctly) to not only test certain business ideas fairly quickly but to also improve their skillset & grow their network at the same time. It's like killing 3 birds with one stone 😆
Awesome, but the profession also has its drawbacks. From the constant impostor syndrome to lack of motivation and sometimes lack of social life (due to spending the whole time debugging stupid errors).
Anyways, rollercoaster of traits being a dev. Good article tho 💪
Exactly, the roulette pictures explain it all, you never know. I once made a trashy meme creator app just a joke and it got 100k users in a few months. Too bad I didn't try to profit from it at the time.
There could be many reasons for it.. one being to keep polishing our skills. it feels awesome building new stuff. Also, nobody knows when someone could get lucky. and his project being picked up by some investor or may be sale. .
Moshe Feldenkrais, a former accredited movement therapist, defined learning in the following way:
Tying shoelaces is something most people can do only one way. When you learn other ways, learning begins.
This applies to all areas of life, like building applications.
Wouldn't that be a great idea for an app in which users describe everyday problems and other users contribute alternative solutions?
There's a different joy in getting your 1st user from a product you ideated & built from scratch than getting 1000 users in a company you're working for.
I am currently working as a developer in the company I co-founded. We do $500.000 ARR, and have . For some reason I agreed to a no work outside the company clause in my contract. This means that I can't work on any side projects that have the slightest chance of being monetizable.
As an entrepreneur and developer, that little detail, is killing me slowly.
It has gotten to the point that I am seriously considering quitting the very company I founded, just so I can scratch the itch of building things. And no, they won't change my contract. I already tried.
This shows how important these side projects are.
How important it is for us to be in motion, and always working on the next lottery ticket or the current technology that we are hyped about.
Well, some may say that this is against the contract. but maybe you can build product independently & once it starts generating revenue - you leave your job if you truly feel your soul is slowly dying. you could also delegate that side project & give it to someone else, you can simply partake in the customer questioning process so that you can really focus on the pain points of potential users + convert.
Also, would you consider adding your startup into a network where you'd get plugged into investors?
That would definitely be against my contract, and I would risk a hefty fine. That's why I haven't been doing that. I am also a straight shooter. I want things to be by the books.
What do you mean by a network plugged into investors?
I don't get why companies don't allow people to do side projects. Sure don't allow side projects that are competing with the company you work at, but if you want to do something completely irrelevant why stop it. By allowing you to do side projects, you have the potential to improve your skills and potentially bring what you've learnt back into the company.
I run a large engineering team, and the most obvious reason is that it adds the risk of burnout. We are not a slow-moving pace company; we are a fast-growing startup that compensates everyone really well. If you want to learn something new, there are tons of opportunities. We will even reward you for going out of your way. If it is because you just want to start something of your own, then maybe working for a startup is not for you now. Regardless of which it is, we assume that to live a healthy life, you take time off after work to be with friends and family. If you don't, then we cannot predict if you are at risk of burnout. To be clear, we don't restrict anyone from taking side projects, but if your health or performance starts to deteriorate, then you have to make a choice.
That does make sense, I guess startups are a little different in terms of pace compared to an fully established ticking along kind of company. I've not worked for a startup so difficult to know the difference.
I know though that if my current company brought in a rule to not allow side projects outside of work, i would very seriously consider leaving.
In practice, I've not seen any company have "we do not allow side projects" policy. These might exist, I've just not encountered one and I am not sure how that could be even enforced (outside being a cause for your termination). Typically it is going to be IP assignment or disclosure that puts off employees from working on side projects. I have worked in companies that have the latter, and in all cases, a simple conversation with CTO or head of engineering got me an exemption.
OPs case of a "I am co-founder" and "they won't change my contract" make no sense to me. I cannot imagine a conversation where I told my co-founder that I want to have a side project, and established clear boundaries, and I would somehow get told "no". Just not how co-founder relationships work.
That being said, if my co-founder asked me if they can have a side-project with intent to generate revenue (as opposed to a side-product of running a side project), I would highly question their reason – why not double the revenue of the company that you've co-founded?
For me, OP, the problem arises at the slightest chance of any possibility of revenue in the side project. Even free projects is not allowed, as they believe it will make me lose focus when growing.
I would love to double the revenue of the company that I co-founded, but that's just not how things work. We have a road map of things that need to be built, and me using my 3 hours of free time in the evening to work even more on the same tasks, is a sure way to give me a mental meltdown.
Trust me, I have done that for years. This is not a new company.
The model has to be wrong. I am a living proof of it being wrong.
I get that investors, founders may have the best of intentions for the company in this regard. But I think they are wrong in not acknowledging that we as people are different, and need different things to keep us happy.
Even though I am the co-founder, and have a no other work clause, I am still paid poorly. I could probably double my salary if I were to get work outside of this company.
The idea was always, exit strategy expectations. But going on 7 years now, no exit is near.
I am doing same and creating different side projects along with my job. But I launched only one project recently. The project which I launch is just for testing that what is the response and if it succeed then I can move with my other side project. Actually my side project is a Shopify App which help merchants to easily create cross-sell/upsells and progress bar offers. If anyone want to check then you can check it here: https://apps.shopify.com/bagify
It's enthralling to witness something you've developed come to life when you're programming. Creating side ventures, on the other hand, is not the same as starting a business https://drift-boss.co/
I think many of us (including myself) enjoy building. Programming is creative and fun and it's enchanting to see something you've created come to life. Creating side projects is different than a startup though.
To me, side projects are fun programming projects that may not have much marketing or business strategy behind it. A startup is a programming project that runs in conjunction with business and marketing.
Having multiple side projects rather than focusing your attention on one idea/startup is a great way for you to fail quickly and learn from those failures. And because they were small, you probably didn't spend that much time or money on them, so the failure isn't really that bad, but what you learned from the failure is huge. Essentially, you get real smart, real quick, increasing your chances of creating a side project that scales to a big and profitable business.
Exactly! Why put all your eggs in one basket when you can have many baskets? If one fails you've got a dozen other projects. Much less risky and you increase your chances of success because one of them is bound to do well.
Because of the joy of building and programming. Once you learn to write code, it's like a therapy.
... until you understand that it's the 'marketing and sales' that gives you bread and butter.
Dear god that comment hit me right in my soul :D
Hah! Everyday story for most of us devs.
Haha, so true. Similar to why writers write, painters paint, or musicians make music. Only, we're lucky in that there are more lucrative, and available, jobs for our skills.
So true and til today i havent figured out a solution for that dilemma. Ill write a book „the coder‘s dilemma“
Really, that's great.
Well, basically.. because we can?
Being a developer is a free pass to create solutions literally to any field that exists and the best part of it is that while building cool stuff (or boring stuff, sometimes) we can get more experience and evolve. Think of it: we can learn and improve what we can deliver just by creating stuff. Randomly. Everyday.
Being a developer is a choice to be free, especially if you are an indie hacker.
Yeh my new side Projects where always with the key in mind to learn something new.
are you working on any side projects currently or can you join some ?
That's great.
Having tools in place to make things as per own will irrespective of location or huge setup is rare, most of the profession require particular environment/setup or tools to do the job and requires others contribution
Doctor can’t practice at home or do WFH
It’s hard to make films by one person without crew.
Pilots can’t fly aeroplane in close room
But software developer can turn their imagination into reality with minimum resources without depending on other person. It’s possible for software developer to work on many projects, still do the daily job.
There are other really interesting part of developers side hustling already explained in this article I agreed to are learning, curiosity to make something and to get money out of it. 👍🏻
Yeah, it can seem a little bit nuts when you take a step back and look at it. When I my non-engineering friends ask me what my hobbies are, I'm like... "I go home and code."
"So... you work 8 hours a day coding, then you code some more on the weekend for fun...?"
Yep, sounds about right!
Can relate
I'm not a developer, but I'm building a lot of mini side projects also. You never know which one will bring in an extra 10k/month
what tools are you using to build the mini side projects, given that you're not a dev?
Having any luck so far?
not with income, but definitely in social capital.
https://findapath.us got 20k visits the first day
my newsletter www.dontbeboring.wtf is growing in subscribers faster than I thought it would
I think most developers build their own side projects because they are scratching their own itch. Most of my products have been tools I've needed, and I built them to solve a problem I am facing. A side benefit is figuring out how to get others to use your product and hopefully pay for it.
Why build a pie for someone else when you can build it for yourself, for your users, and for fun?
I know for me personally, I love building things from scratch. Coding and building side projects is a creative outlet for me. Also in a lot of cases, programmers might not be working on something they're really passionate about in their day job so working on a side project is an opportunity to work on something they're more emotionally invested in.
what are you currently building now?
I work full-time as a smart contract developer. With a few side projects. https://louper.dev my most used at the moment.
Just anecdotal rambling:
I had a side project once building a chrome extension which solved a pain for at its best time 2k users. It wasn’t very lucrative but i made about 300 bucks in donations along the line.
The joy i had working on this, directly interacting with my users releasing updates / features. And supporting them in onboarding my tool - it was the reason i made software my bread and butter.
Never got this joy from any commercial project / dayjob and am still in pursuit of regaining this.
what kind of products would you enjoy building? meaning- would you enjoy building products that help people in the tech industry, products that help devs build better products, products for the healthtech industry,ed tech etc.
IMO developers have this amazing opportunity (if leveraged correctly) to not only test certain business ideas fairly quickly but to also improve their skillset & grow their network at the same time. It's like killing 3 birds with one stone 😆
Awesome, but the profession also has its drawbacks. From the constant impostor syndrome to lack of motivation and sometimes lack of social life (due to spending the whole time debugging stupid errors).
Anyways, rollercoaster of traits being a dev. Good article tho 💪
Exactly, the roulette pictures explain it all, you never know. I once made a trashy meme creator app just a joke and it got 100k users in a few months. Too bad I didn't try to profit from it at the time.
Because they are trying to different experiment.
Because it's like a casino :D
There could be many reasons for it.. one being to keep polishing our skills. it feels awesome building new stuff. Also, nobody knows when someone could get lucky. and his project being picked up by some investor or may be sale. .
I think because have can actually make something that we have on our mind!!
Thanks for all you information. developers building so many projects to enjoy it. https://apkjade.com/island-war-mod-apk/
Moshe Feldenkrais, a former accredited movement therapist, defined learning in the following way:
Tying shoelaces is something most people can do only one way. When you learn other ways, learning begins.
This applies to all areas of life, like building applications.
Wouldn't that be a great idea for an app in which users describe everyday problems and other users contribute alternative solutions?
Because I think they want to strengthen their marketing side. The more products they create, the more they will appeal to and promote themselves.
Before answering this question I would ask:
Most of us get into coding because we like building stuff and code is probably the simplest way to do so. You just need a laptop...
So the reason why a lot of devs love having side projects is that that's the reason why they became developers in the first place...
so, do you market these products?
that's when you start shifting from a dev with side projects to an entrepreneur. You need a different set of skills for that...
There's a different joy in getting your 1st user from a product you ideated & built from scratch than getting 1000 users in a company you're working for.
I am currently working as a developer in the company I co-founded. We do $500.000 ARR, and have . For some reason I agreed to a no work outside the company clause in my contract. This means that I can't work on any side projects that have the slightest chance of being monetizable.
As an entrepreneur and developer, that little detail, is killing me slowly.
It has gotten to the point that I am seriously considering quitting the very company I founded, just so I can scratch the itch of building things. And no, they won't change my contract. I already tried.
This shows how important these side projects are.
How important it is for us to be in motion, and always working on the next lottery ticket or the current technology that we are hyped about.
Well, some may say that this is against the contract. but maybe you can build product independently & once it starts generating revenue - you leave your job if you truly feel your soul is slowly dying. you could also delegate that side project & give it to someone else, you can simply partake in the customer questioning process so that you can really focus on the pain points of potential users + convert.
Also, would you consider adding your startup into a network where you'd get plugged into investors?
That would definitely be against my contract, and I would risk a hefty fine. That's why I haven't been doing that. I am also a straight shooter. I want things to be by the books.
What do you mean by a network plugged into investors?
well - had your startup been generating revenue - we would add your startup to a community of investors.
Would you be in any startup communities besides IH?
I don't get why companies don't allow people to do side projects. Sure don't allow side projects that are competing with the company you work at, but if you want to do something completely irrelevant why stop it. By allowing you to do side projects, you have the potential to improve your skills and potentially bring what you've learnt back into the company.
I run a large engineering team, and the most obvious reason is that it adds the risk of burnout. We are not a slow-moving pace company; we are a fast-growing startup that compensates everyone really well. If you want to learn something new, there are tons of opportunities. We will even reward you for going out of your way. If it is because you just want to start something of your own, then maybe working for a startup is not for you now. Regardless of which it is, we assume that to live a healthy life, you take time off after work to be with friends and family. If you don't, then we cannot predict if you are at risk of burnout. To be clear, we don't restrict anyone from taking side projects, but if your health or performance starts to deteriorate, then you have to make a choice.
That does make sense, I guess startups are a little different in terms of pace compared to an fully established ticking along kind of company. I've not worked for a startup so difficult to know the difference.
I know though that if my current company brought in a rule to not allow side projects outside of work, i would very seriously consider leaving.
In practice, I've not seen any company have "we do not allow side projects" policy. These might exist, I've just not encountered one and I am not sure how that could be even enforced (outside being a cause for your termination). Typically it is going to be IP assignment or disclosure that puts off employees from working on side projects. I have worked in companies that have the latter, and in all cases, a simple conversation with CTO or head of engineering got me an exemption.
OPs case of a "I am co-founder" and "they won't change my contract" make no sense to me. I cannot imagine a conversation where I told my co-founder that I want to have a side project, and established clear boundaries, and I would somehow get told "no". Just not how co-founder relationships work.
That being said, if my co-founder asked me if they can have a side-project with intent to generate revenue (as opposed to a side-product of running a side project), I would highly question their reason – why not double the revenue of the company that you've co-founded?
For me, OP, the problem arises at the slightest chance of any possibility of revenue in the side project. Even free projects is not allowed, as they believe it will make me lose focus when growing.
I would love to double the revenue of the company that I co-founded, but that's just not how things work. We have a road map of things that need to be built, and me using my 3 hours of free time in the evening to work even more on the same tasks, is a sure way to give me a mental meltdown.
Trust me, I have done that for years. This is not a new company.
The model has to be wrong. I am a living proof of it being wrong.
I get that investors, founders may have the best of intentions for the company in this regard. But I think they are wrong in not acknowledging that we as people are different, and need different things to keep us happy.
Even though I am the co-founder, and have a no other work clause, I am still paid poorly. I could probably double my salary if I were to get work outside of this company.
The idea was always, exit strategy expectations. But going on 7 years now, no exit is near.
I am doing same and creating different side projects along with my job. But I launched only one project recently. The project which I launch is just for testing that what is the response and if it succeed then I can move with my other side project. Actually my side project is a Shopify App which help merchants to easily create cross-sell/upsells and progress bar offers. If anyone want to check then you can check it here: https://apps.shopify.com/bagify
Satisfaction :-)
But..... is free marketing
It's enthralling to witness something you've developed come to life when you're programming. Creating side ventures, on the other hand, is not the same as starting a business https://drift-boss.co/
I think many of us (including myself) enjoy building. Programming is creative and fun and it's enchanting to see something you've created come to life. Creating side projects is different than a startup though.
To me, side projects are fun programming projects that may not have much marketing or business strategy behind it. A startup is a programming project that runs in conjunction with business and marketing.
Having multiple side projects rather than focusing your attention on one idea/startup is a great way for you to fail quickly and learn from those failures. And because they were small, you probably didn't spend that much time or money on them, so the failure isn't really that bad, but what you learned from the failure is huge. Essentially, you get real smart, real quick, increasing your chances of creating a side project that scales to a big and profitable business.
Exactly! Why put all your eggs in one basket when you can have many baskets? If one fails you've got a dozen other projects. Much less risky and you increase your chances of success because one of them is bound to do well.
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This comment was deleted 2 years ago.
This comment was deleted 2 years ago.