u/-Joby- — reddlx

This seemed like a fun first project. Baby Einstein xylophone uses metal detectors under the wood cover and LEDs. The last image I flipped vertically so it matches the second and you can see what’s going on underneath. Top left affect the lights, top right the sensors. There aren’t many other resistors… it looks like R13 goes to the speaker (lower right set of wires out) from the underside. Though there is no resistor there. Touching resistors to it doesn’t seem to do anything. Is it connected to those solder points, already joined? Im really new to this but have soldered kits before, but not sure how I should be testing points for bending? I thought I could touch a resistor to the resistors but itll just take the path of least resistance right? Trying to just bridge the ends of components hasn’t done anything. How does one probe for points? Or is this just too new and all in the black blob? Thanks

Serious question. I shipped my first macOS app after a year of constant focused development. Not a month of vibe coding. I quit my job and am building a new career with 30 years of software engineering experience. It's a niche app called Video Barbershop, focused video editing designed for bulk editing of clips with an emphasis on captured VHS tapes. It's my personal hobby and a hobby for many I know. Feedback I get is it's a game changer for those that could use an app like this... but I can only get a couple people to try it so far.

Starting an app development business from scratch, the ability to reach my audience seems to be limited to posting in related communities, Meta/Reddit ads, or word of mouth. However, most communities have a "no self promotion" clause... so really just ads, since no one knows about my app so no word of mouth yet. So I run highly targeted ads and very general focused ads to compare outcomes. I get many followers from the general ads and no conversion from either. Many just seem to be either bots or influencers growing their brand by following everyone hoping for follow backs.

The entire system feels like a dead mall. You pay for your place in it, you pay for ads lining the dead mall's walls, but the customers aren't there to discover you... the only eyes I'm truly getting are the other dead mall shop owners asking each other how they got business... because all we see are ads saying how business boomed through buying ads.

How does a niche app find an audience when communities only allow conversations about apps that already found their audience? Larger more general communities like this allow some minimal self promotion... but I'm not trying to sell a generic general purpose app... and most of us are app developers trying to sell our apps, not buy others'.

Has anyone actually developed a sustainable app business, or are we all just speculators owning a virtual storefront in the world's largest dead mall, and the only business out there are services to businesses with products no one finds?

I've looked at Peer Push and similar and they look even more like business owners gathering to display ads... to an audience that is just the business owners themselves who are displaying ads. It fees like AI and vibe coding is nothing more than a mechanism to generate even more app owners to rent out space to in a dead mall.

Does anyone have a success story with any actual details from starting out in a dead mall to having a consistent business with their app?