“ To give anything less than your best, is to sacrifice the gift. ”
— Steve Prefontaine
On July 31, 2019, I left my full-time job as a software engineer. It paid well, and I got to work with some talented folks on an interesting product, but it wasn’t something that I have been wanting to pursue next. So as crazy as it sounds, and I am still uncomfortable about it, I have taken the first step towards that next. It’s ambitious, exciting, and nerve-racking. The general idea is to build things independently, of high quality, with strong ethics, what feels right, and make that into a sustainable indie software business.
I have no clue if that is doable. I could crash and burn in 12-18 months, but let’s not digress too far. For now I do not want to think about plan B, but focus on what I can do to build a successful indie business.
Where do we start? I have had this side project called Tempo. Tempo is a fantastic app for runners. Runners love it. It has 3 years of slow-paced, but solid development under it, and a bunch of paying customers. I believe it has a lot of potential for various reasons. And it converges my love for running with the craft of building products into one. So that’s where we are going to start.
There's a solid roadmap for Tempo that I am starting with. A lot of it is based on feedback and feature requests from real runners over the past 3 years. My focus here is going to be simple, and based on the same core principle that Tempo was built with: build the best app for runners, with strong emphasis on privacy and quality design. Do that at a healthy pace, make constant progress, and keep shipping, while paying careful attention to revenue and growth.
That’s my general indie plan, my next adventure.
I can really use all the help I can get. If you would like to help, here are some ideas,
If you run with an Apple Watch, please download Tempo and subscribe. And if you don’t find Tempo good enough yet, please reach out, and let me know how I can make it better for you to subscribe.
If you do any kind of app reviews or publishing, please write about Tempo. Again, if it’s not there yet, please let me know what would make Tempo worthy of your time.
Help spread the word by telling your running friends and family about Tempo. You can share it easily by suggesting to checkout tempo.run.
If you are an indie developer, let’s connect. I would love to learn as much as I can about making this work.
You can find me on twitter @rmatta, or email rahul@indie.sh.