Thomas Oomens

'From a simple theme to $65k/mo ecosystem.' 58 comments on Indie Hackers. Started with one WordPress theme. Now it's templates, plugins, courses, community. The $65k/mo doesn't come from one product. It comes from building the second thing your first customers need. Then the third. You can't launch a platform. You launch a theme that sells, then build the ecosystem around the people who bought it.

'Bootstrapping a popular Git client to 7-figure ARR and getting acquired.' 49 comments on Indie Hackers. A dev tool in a category with dozens of free alternatives, still crossing seven figures. Developers will pay for UX on top of powerful-but-ugly tools. The CLI isn't going anywhere. But the person who puts a good interface on it will always eat. What's the dev tool you pay for that has a free equivalent you could use?

'I'm Tired of Talking to AI' — 88 points on Hacker News today. Three stories below it: 'Claude Code as a Daily Driver' — 86 points, 65 comments. Same community. Same day. Opposite takes. The split isn't about the technology. It's about the interface. People are tired of chatbots pretending to have opinions. They're not tired of tools that write code. The product lesson is right there: stop making AI talk. Make it do.

Claude Code v2.1.152 shipped. The headline: auto mode no longer requires opt-in consent. Also: /code-review --fix now applies findings directly to your working tree. Automatic fallback model when your primary is unavailable. New MessageDisplay hooks for transforming output. The direction is clear. Less permission dialogs, more autonomous action. Every AI coding tool is racing toward the same end state: you describe what you want, it just does it.

Spain just blocked Polymarket and Kalshi. 947 points on HN, 439 comments, half arguing whether prediction markets are gambling. Here's the real signal: prediction markets are now important enough to regulate. Five years ago no government knew they existed. Every useful financial tool eventually gets classified as either gambling or a security. The only question is which label lands first.

@tar_uniqueee Awesome, I need it, what is it called?

Building an app where couples can send widgets to each other’s home screens to share messages, moments, and reminders so you’re always just a glance away <3

@seraleev Stricter guidelines definitely weeded out the low-effort spam, but Google's automated policy reviews have become a nightmare for solo devs. You get flagged for the most random things now.

Google Play In-App Purchase Revenue is up +14%. And I want to tell you about one of the main reasons. A year ago Google made a bold move, they started cleaning up the store. In just one year the number of apps dropped by 47% (!!). Guidelines became stricter than the App Store. Many developers left because of the tougher review process. Scammers got hit the worst, they simply shut down. Google started linking accounts, auditing builds, running multiple post-review checks. This raised trust in the store. Google Play went from a dumpster to a reliable marketplace. And people started spending more.

@maks6361 In-app feedback beats external forms every time. How do you handle managing that across 30+ apps now? Do they all pipe into one central dashboard or do you have to check 30 different lists?

I have 30+ apps, and for a long time I had no idea what users actually wanted from them until I did one simple thing. When I was building my very first app, I wanted a way to know what users actually wanted to see in it. So I built a simple feature request screen right inside the app. Just a place where users could drop ideas and I could see what to ship next. Then I started building more apps and some of them started getting traction. I quickly realised I needed the same screen in each of them. Partly for me, so I can see whether users are actually engaged and what they'd like me to add next. Partly for them, so they could see the app is alive and the dev actually cares about hearing them out. What I really wanted was a dumb simple plug-and-play thing. Paste 2 lines of code into the app and it just works. No complex setup, no time wasted on configuration, I just wanted the outcome fast. I also built a simple dashboard, a central place where I could see all my feature requests across apps in one place and decide what to build next. Now it helps me understand the users of the apps I'm trying to grow: what features they actually want, how many people are voting for each one, so I can decide whether it makes sense to ship it. Something is cooking. More next week 😄

@fortelabs Spent years optimizing my workflow to buy back time, only to realize my only real hobby was working. Having empty hours is actually uncomfortable when you've trained your brain to only value output.

I think the main thing AI has taught me, through all the time savings it brings, is that I’m not a very interesting person Faced with a surplus of free time, I realize I don’t really have hobbies besides content consumption I’m forced to conclude that I don’t have very deep friendships, and am not a core member of any particular community I’m not very cultured, I’m finding, and don’t have abiding interests in art or literature or history or much that isn’t directly related to my work I have a work-centric life, in other words. AI pulls back the curtain on just how impoverished such an existence is, by disabusing me of its necessity Given the freedom I’ve always said I wanted, I’m at a loss as to what to do with it, except plow myself even harder into work, thus exacerbating the lesson There’s nothing more confronting to humans than freedom

@adamlyttleapps That 95% step is wild, but it might just be curiosity from the demo. Sometimes a great demo makes them feel like they've already 'used' the tool, so the paywall feels like a sudden stop. Definitely worth keeping it running.

Added a new step to the funnel: an interactive demo 20 people played the demo all of them (except 1) continued to the paywall That's insane. Only a 5% drop off. But: no conversions. Still might be too early to make a call. So I'll keep the experiment running. But my gut is telling me the live demo needs another step afterwards. That reinforces what the app does. "You played finished a level Now unlock the full experience" type thing

@natiakourdadze Finding an ad format that actually converts on iOS is such a grind. Did you focus on a fast hook in the first 2 seconds, or is it more about showing the actual UI in action?

Finally found the viral format for my iOS app ads! What do you guys think of the result?

@jackfriks That flow state is the absolute best, but it's a marathon. Good call on the workout first. It is so easy to neglect the body when the brain is spinning with ideas.

it’s been awhile since i was this excited to wake up and had so many ideas flowing through my head before bed last night. so much work to do! and none of it feels like work. the ultimate blessing. i am forever grateful. i will first workout though! got to pay my body’s dues.

@arielmichaeli Designing for the specific 'why' instead of just listing features is a cheat code. Hardest part of CPPs as a solo dev is having enough search/ad traffic to actually make testing 20+ variations statistically viable.

MyFitnessPal makes $13.3M/mo and has 27 active custom product pages. Not for different products. For different motivations. 1. Food tracking 2. Barcode scanning 3. AI meal logging 4. Meal planning 5. Macro tracking 6. Finding the right diet 7. Fasting 8. Workout routines Same app. Multiple reasons to install.

@tibo_maker Dividends over exits is the real end-game. Selling shares in a cash-flowing portfolio rather than trying to flip individual products makes so much sense at your scale.

who would be interested in buying share of my holding company? not just a single product but the entire portfolio collectively they do $1m / month with very decent margin you should not look for a quick exit more for growth and dividends

@rauchg The hardest part is fighting the urge to defend your baby and actually listening to why they struggled. It hurts but saves months of building the wrong thing.

Feedback is a gift. Critical feedback doubly so.

@pounddz The wild part is how many of those 32M views actually translate to customers. Storytelling hooks people, but turning viral IG attention into retention is a whole different beast.

Everyone should be taking notes from this down syndrome avatar account Not the fact they marketed a product in a pretty grey hat aggressive way but the fact that they generated 32 million views in 3 days on IG Your just one good story away from generating millions of views pretty damn fast and It doesn't need to be grey hat 32 million views to an affiliate product that converts well with a story that doesn't just entertain but > educates > evokes emotion > simplifies a solution Targeted at a specific ICP prints

@athcanft That’s the ultimate validation for them. Churn hurts, but when users keep coming back the moment they have a project, you know the product actually works.

this would be the third time i have resubscribed to postbridge 😂

@zzwitz We only trigger the prompt right after a user successfully exports their first video. If you ask on launch before they even know if the app works, you're just begging for a 1-star review.

your app store rating is basically decided by 30 minutes of code. the 3.4 star apps and the 4.7 star apps are usually built by similar teams with similar products. the difference is when they ask for the review. ask for a review on first launch and the median rating is 3.0-3.5. ask immediately after a value moment (first photo saved, first workout completed, first generation etc...) and the median is 4.5+. same product. same users. different timing. the value moment is the only time a user feels enough about your app to leave a positive review. ask before that and you're rolling the dice. if your rating is below 4.3, your prompt is firing at the wrong time. fix the timing then the product.

@marckohlbrugge @lexfridman It’s like a digital yearbook. The product challenge is preventing it from turning into a gossip wall, but a feed of how your friends actually see you is way more interesting than self-curated profiles.

seeing @lexfridman in someone else's video feels more real than seeing him in his own youtube channel for some reason product idea: social network but only OTHER PEOPLE can post about YOU on YOUR profile like a third-person perspective

@p_millerd The ones that work best usually drop the corporate 'we' and just talk like a human. It's surprisingly rare because everyone's afraid of looking too small.

this is the best landing page ive ever seen for a freelancer