Now

This is my "now page" inspired by Derek Sivers' idea that we should all have a simple page answering "What are you focused on right now?" Think of it as what you'd tell a friend you hadn't seen in a year.

No algorithms, no character limits, no social media noise. Just an honest snapshot of where I am right now, updated whenever something significant changes. Check out nownownow.com if you want to see what others are up to.

The Journey So Far

Five months ago I left full-time employment to build my own products. At the time, I was full of momentum. Three apps in seven weeks, guns blazing, nothing could stop me. The reality since then has been more nuanced. The building was the easy part. Everything that comes after, the marketing, promotion, and dealing with crowded markets and vibe coded competition, that's where it gets difficult.

I'm not going to sugarcoat it. Some days I wonder if I made the right call. Other days the numbers tick up, a customer emails about a feature they love, and it all makes sense again. Right now, I'm cautiously optimistic. Semi-optimistic? Cautiously semi-optimistic. Let's go with that.

Five Apps, Five Months

Since leaving in August, I've shipped four macOS apps and started work on a web app. Here's where everything stands.

Kanodo (The Flagship)

The native macOS Kanban app that started it all. After a saga of App Store rejections covering entitlement issues, accessibility concerns, and preview video nitpicking, it was finally approved on 7th January. It's already my top revenue earner, which is both validating and slightly annoying given how long it took to get through review. Kanodo is now in maintenance mode. Bug fixes if reported, but no new features unless users start requesting them.

AudiBar (The Steady Performer)

My first shipped product continues to surprise me. Downloads and revenue roughly tripled on a monthly basis after the January marketing push. It's had a substantial UI overhaul since launch, including custom colour themes, streaming audio support, a proper resizable playlist window, and in-app volume controls added after a customer request. Two hour turnaround from email to fix submitted. Not bad for a one man operation. AudiBar is in maintenance mode alongside the others.

Chronode (The Self-Published One)

The automatic time tracker that can't be sandboxed for the App Store. It got its first sale in January, which was immediately followed by bug reports. Docker Desktop uses different internal identifiers, focus mode needed reworking, and the refresh rate was too slow. Real users find real problems. Testing never catches everything. Chronode is ticking along, now in maintenance mode.

BillKit (The Six Rejection Special)

My invoice processing app with AI extraction. Getting this through the App Store took six submissions. Apple drip fed rejections like a bureaucratic advent calendar. Invalid privacy URL, missing terms links, restore purchase buttons, China availability issues. Each fix revealed a new problem they hadn't mentioned before. It's live now, and it was my first subscription based app, which taught me a lot about App Store economics. Also in maintenance mode.

Exoden (The Next Chapter)

This is where my focus lives now. Exoden is a Laravel and Livewire web app. Invertebrate collection management built for hobbyists, not breeders. Track feedings, manage your animals, and sync across any device with a clean, simple interface. Supports tarantulas, scorpions, isopods, mantids, and more. No overcomplicated forms or bloated features.

The core foundation is in place. Passwordless authentication with magic links, passkey support, 2FA, Stripe subscription handling, and real-time notifications via Reverb. Now I'm building the actual product. I'm targeting a release around May 2026 and posting development updates on Dev.to and the Exoden dev log.

The Marketing Reality

January was marketing month. I'd spent four months building and zero months telling anyone about it. So I put together a marketing plan, listed apps on product directories, localised App Store metadata, submitted to Product Hunt, posted on social media, and tried to engage on Reddit.

The results were mixed. The product listing sites generated more spam than traffic. Within days my inbox was flooded with AI generated emails that had scraped the listings and blasted out personalised looking pitches at scale. Reddit shadowbanned my account within two weeks of signing up, with no warning and no explanation. Two weeks of genuine technical contributions into the void. The 250 character appeal process is almost comically inadequate. I haven't heard back.

The App Store Optimisation work was worth doing, and the numbers did improve. But the broader lesson was humbling. Marketing indie apps right now is brutal. The market is flooded, especially since AI and vibe coding mean everyone can publish apps with minimal effort. I genuinely think it should be disclosed if an app was vibe coded, so customers can make informed decisions about trusting their data to something that might be riddled with bugs or security holes. But that's just my take.

I've stepped back from active marketing. The ASO work is done, and the apps will have to prove themselves on their own momentum. If they're good enough to generate downloads and revenue organically, they will. If not, that's useful information too.

The Numbers

I'm keeping the specific figures for the blog posts, but in broad strokes, total revenue across everything is still less than £75. It's early days, and the trajectory is moving in the right direction. January alone brought in nearly three times what the entire last four months of 2025 did. Website traffic, search impressions, and bounce rates have all improved across the portfolio. Kanodo emerged as the breakout product with the strongest metrics across the board.

The financial picture overall is stable. I have funds allocated for the year with additional backup available. This isn't generating a living yet, not even close, but the foundation is there.

Part-Time Work

From June 2026, I'll be looking for part-time work as a Laravel/PHP developer, ideally three days a week. Whether that's employed, contracted, or freelance is still up in the air. The plan is to supplement the indie income so I can keep building my own products with the remaining time.

Lessons From the Trenches

Five months of shipping has taught me things no tutorial or course ever could.

App Store economics are sobering

My first sale was £2.99. After VAT and Apple's 30% cut, I kept £1.67. That's 56% of the sale price. I've since been accepted onto Apple's Small Business Program which drops the commission to 15%, but the maths of indie app pricing is still eye opening.

Security is an ongoing battle

Bots hammered my Livewire endpoints relentlessly. I ended up rotating the endpoint paths weekly and automating firewall bans through the Ploi API. If an exception fires from endpoint tampering, a job queues and blocks that IP automatically. The exception emails stopped. Time well spent.

Burnout is real

After three months of 10 to 12 hour days with no days off, my brain waved the white flag. I bought a gaming PC, disappeared into 7 Days to Die for nine days, then realised gaming was just an expensive procrastination machine. Gave the whole setup to my nephew and got back to work. Sometimes the best investment is knowing when to cut your losses, even if those losses come with RGB lighting.

Production reveals what testing never will

Every single app had bugs that only surfaced during real usage. Chronode's Docker tracking, AudiBar's iCloud loading, BillKit's edge cases. You click differently when you're not thinking about testing.

Other Things

Health reset

Four months of going from chair to couch to bed took its toll. I'd gained weight and wasn't happy about it. Since January I've gone back to 18:6 intermittent fasting with an eating window of 2pm to 8pm, and have mostly stuck to it. I've also been taking the family dog out for a mile walk every evening around 7pm. Every single day since 1st January except one, when I was ill. Not new year's resolutions. Just decisions that needed making.

Tarantula Burial

The Brazilian White Knee tarantula is doing well. Had its first moult a few weeks back after burying itself without food for five to six weeks. I knew it had gone into pre-moult so the concern was limited, but there's always that moment of "should I be worried?" Answer: no. It emerged bigger and hungrier than before. I'm still not sure what sex it is as I cant access it's moult at the momment (it buried it deep!)

Where My Head's At

Five months in. Four apps shipped. One web app in development. Less than £75 in total revenue. A market flooded with vibe coded apps and AI generated noise. A marketing landscape that punishes genuine contributors and rewards spam. It's not looking so great is it?

And yet, the apps work. People are downloading them. The search positions are improving. The foundation exists. I'm building Exoden, which plays to my strongest skills in Laravel, and I'm genuinely excited about it.

Is this working? Not yet. Not financially. Far from it in all honesty. But the trajectory is there, and I'm giving it time. From June I hope to have part-time work to take the pressure off, and the apps will either find their audience or they won't. Either way, I'll have built real products that solve real problems, and I'll have learnt more in five months than in years of employment.

Cautiously semi-optimistic. That'll do for now.

If you're thinking about making a similar leap or already have, drop me a line . Always happy to compare notes.