

Etude on the iPad—A Young Boston Developer Follows the Music to San Francisco - robertbud1
http://www.xconomy.com/san-francisco/2010/06/23/etude-on-the-ipad-a-young-boston-developer-follows-the-music-to-san-francisco/

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wallflower
I give a lot of credit to dangrover for creating and shipping a product that
people want to have (Etude for iOS).

Dan's been fairly active in the HN community, and I think a lof of us have
been inspired by his success as an indie developer. If he wants to sell his
product to another company, that's his choice. If he wants to live in Silicon
Valley, that's his choice. Maybe some of you in the HN community in the bay
area can help him out. It seems like he's trying to address the number one
issue with ETude - the lack of music publisher contracts, at the least.

I had no idea Dan was so young. I think he's different from the other masses
because he has dreams _and_ cash flow. He's more like an successful
entrepreneur than some of the other dreamers because he has some success
already.

I'm curious why Tap Tap Tap was such a sucky place to work. Is it because
there is an inner circle?

"Show HN: I finally released that sheet music app I keep yammering about"

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1196055>

"Etude for iPad is out"

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1399258>

~~~
dangrover
Tapulous, not Tap Tap Tap. I like Tap Tap Tap. :)

~~~
wallflower
Thanks. I get/got them confused.

In case you read this, what do you think of SwankoLab? It seems to push the
envelope for creativity because it gives normal users the tools to
programatically alter their photos. Very clever how they did that, too.

<http://swankolab.com>

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vessenes
Hey Dan, here are my thoughts on monetizing Etude better: first is a bookstore
model for music publishers; allow them to sell through Etude. Right now, I
think you only allow free downloads, right? You've got a walled garden setup
thanks to Steve, so there should be very little concern about copying and
piracy from the publishers.

Second is opening up the market for piano teachers. One thought - it would be
super super cool to have the app recognize what notes you're playing on the
piano and mark them. There's an interesting discussion over at
[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1457228/pitch-
recognition...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1457228/pitch-recognition-
of-musical-notes-on-a-smart-phone) on this.

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jeb
Yikes, this is the typical silliness that seems to be the post-web 2.0 trend.
Rather than people coming up with new ideas and new ways to make companies,
they do something derivative, spend a lot of time in design, then rush to san
fransisco to huddle in with the other masses of 20-26 year old MIT/Stanford
graduates who are following all the VCs and Angels on twitter.

I thought being an entreprenuer was about being free, and not about confining
yourself to a certain space and trying to meet the expectations of certain
people, who are only trying to maximise THEIR profit? What's the difference to
a job then, apart from the potential stakes?

~~~
ashearer
I don't understand the negativity. You could make an argument that there are
too many startups duplicating effort with similar ideas (with the counterpoint
being that there are often valid reasons for that, and established companies
certainly do the same thing). But Etude doesn't really fit that mold. It has
its own niche.

His story is that he worked for software development shops but didn't enjoy
it, built up his own side business until it paid the rent, went full-time and
released a new, solidly profitable app, and moved to SF to try his luck in the
startup scene. It fits the HN indie template to a T, but that's not a knock.
He's taking a more independent path than most people no matter how you look at
it.

The first project grew out of software he wrote for himself, and Etude grew
out of his tinkering with an iPhone music synthesizer. How does his awareness
of a target market and prospective acquirers dilute his entrepreneurship? I'm
asking seriously, because I don't understand your point.

~~~
jeb
It's because if you find something that works and that can give you the money
and freedom that I assume entrepreneurs want, then why take the move into a
'closed community'? What he's doing is not entrepreneurship as I imagine it -
what he is doing feels more like trying to insert himself into a social group
of pseudo-entreprenuers.

These are the people who are more interested in their standing within a
certain community, than in actually starting multiple businesses.

I could mention names that fit this template, because there are quite a lot.
What they are doing is not about the money, it's about the fame and the social
ranking they hope to acquire. That's why it disappoints me to see this -
because in my opinion, businessmen should be aggressive money chasers and
should not care what their peers think about them.

~~~
sprout
Personally, I find both the preoccupation with money and status a little
foreign. Me, I just want to do things that make people happy, that make their
lives easier. If I could do that and still have some free time, and still have
some people around who like to be around me, and I like to be around (though
not people who think I'm some sort of superhuman because of my
accomplishments) that would be ideal for me.

~~~
vlad
You're right. Payment processors (including the App Store) should have an
option to cap the amount of income a developer can earn in a month, just in
case an app actually takes off (after a year of hard full-time work on it), to
prevent making developers and customers who hear about it jealous.

Everybody you read about who made X dollars, planned to do so, right? It was
very easy and certain, right?

~~~
sprout
What? I'm just saying I don't like the spotlight, and beyond $60000/year I'd
be inclined to give most of my money away.

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dangrover
Whoah, weird, didn't realize people were talking about this article here.

I blabbed too much about some of the wrong things to that reporter...kind of
afraid of people reading it now. It sort of makes me seem like a dick.

------
arram
Congrats Dan!

