I'm working on: - a very simple monitoring platform (for HTTP and possibly PING) for 2€/mo, that _just works_ - a sort-of-project-management thing for law professionals

This thread has a lot of weird turns I'd not expect.

"All they do is steal 30% from society" - objectively it's for providing a service, an infrastructure, a very solid user market, a very solid developer experience (you have to build for a limited number of iOS versions, you don't have to test on a gazillion devices with different flavors of Android), a slightly higher income userbase, and a few others.

Seeing the whole thing simply as "theft" boggles my mind, especially coming from people working in or around this industry.

Oh the nice folks with the RC-135s!

ah let me get into my jeep to get some xeroxes of my opinion and drive to give them some kleenexes

This is a green heron since the issue at hand isn't "oh but you can study without a diploma", the issue is "you won't be taken seriously because you don't have credentials" e.g. piece of paper.

I mean, what credentials does a humanities graduate actually have? Who would need such knowledge in any job except for a humanities job itself?

The credential is that they were able to pass their classes, hopefully with good grades. Many employers want to know that you are the type of person who succeeds, not that you know some specific thing. University has basically taken the place of apprenticeships because employers don't want to train incompetent people, so they make you show competence with a degree.

Indeed, nobody takes us seriously regardless of what the paperwork says

How true is this though? At least in tech, I have never felt held back by not having a degree. How many jobs does having a humanities degree unlock?

Very true. Every job here is looking for at least a Bsc. You wouldn't really get taken seriously.

I'd play that. Thanks for showing this.

You've been swimming in the VC world too much when you're under the impression that building a Reddit clone is a "$10M-$20M" sized task.

I'm guilty of this. I've had 3 (so far) MVPs made, solo dev, made the infra, the website, the app (for one of those 3), and I'm sitting on my ass afraid to ship.

Could just be procrastination on doing the unfamiliar. You know and possibly enjoy the development part. But it's not the case that you're done with these projects. You're opening yourself up to a LOT more work, which you may not enjoy.

And can you really ship 3 different MVPs? Are these essentially 3 different businesses? Or if they aren't businesses, do you have time to maintain all of them?

I think the the feeling is more complex than fear. Do people overeat because they are hungry? I'm not a therapist, but I'm guessing that eating is their way of comforting themselves. And so, they associate a stressful situation with being hungry. Maybe you're feeling the tangled web of emotions which go with doing the unfamiliar with fear.

IMHO there's nothing wrong with duds. There is more than one way to succeed. I do agree, however, that shipping is better than not

What's stopping you?

No idea. Maybe it's fear, maybe it's something else. Any advice?

You're commenting on a post called "The Fear of Shipping", and you said above you're "afraid to ship". Now you claim you have no idea and could be anything, really.

There is nothing stopping you except your own bullshit. Do the minimum necessary to "ship" and if that's daunting, then you're trying too hard to be too big too fast and you'll never be able to get anywhere at all. Remember that if you actually care about a project, shipping isn't the end of it, but the beginning. You won't be happy with the results of shipping, because no one will notice and even fewer people will care. But if you ship it now, if the perfect user comes along, they'll find your URL somehow (maybe you give it to them) and fall in love with your idea without any further involvement from you. And then you can iterate.

If you don't ship now, then just accept your fate, and stop talking about these projects as though you're going to ship them.

Probably the worry over the next part, which you're probably subconsciously aware of. After shipping the product, comes the worst bit:

.....users......demands...monetary remuneration...support...maintenance...marketing...rejection...

Then it's not a fun educational experience anymore.

The regret of never trying will (eventually) bring you greater sadness than a failed launch. The path of least pain is to launch. Do it.

Maybe fear of social judgement? What would you think of communicating first in a region with a group far away from your social circle ? EG if you’re asian and live in SV, silently deploy and ask people opinion in a related-field forum in the Netherlands or South Africa.

Bonus point: you expend your social circle.

I think you need to be able to answer that question. Spend some time going into depth understanding what really is holding you back. Only then you’d be able to solve it.

Lick the stamp and send it.

I do therapy, meditation and try to do stuff with my hands (right now I’m building a balsa wood RC plane). I also try to wake up very eary despite not liking it, seeing the sun as much as I can and generally trying to move a bit more.

Nice, but I specifically don't want this tool. I work from cafes a few days a week. I'm aware that this is not what cafes are for, so I generally try to consume as much as I can (multiple espressos and water bottles that I'd honestly normally get) to offset that, and also tip generously. I also try to get the most undesirable and/or smaller table, and so far the people appreciated and understood what I'm doing. But then again, I know people are different. So I'm not looking forward for a lot of people to fill cafes and sit there for 4 hours on a 2$ bill, it's just going to hurt me as someone that tries to be mindful of someone's business, and the business owner as someone who'll have to kick out a hobo with a Macbook for sipping an espresso for 5 hours while working for more than the coffee shop makes in a day/week.