Year of positivity
Well, another month has gone by. What’s new? Firstly - my contract at Fox has finished. After a week off (in which i didn’t surf at all), I took a short, part-time contract at an agency in Sydney - it’s been two weeks so far.
As for app store entrepreneurship - well, i’m afraid i’m out of ideas here. Now that IAP has proved unsuccessful in making anything out of my calendar app, my only remaining idea is to get into games. I know, I keep talking about making a SaaS app, but the reality is that my web development skills are pretty mediocre.
So, what’s 2013 going to be all about, then? I know it’s a bit late for new-years resolutions, but what the hell… every year needs a theme. 2013, career-wise, i’ll just focus on contracting. The baby rules out spending a serious amount of time in the evenings on a side business, and i can’t spend the whole year contracting part-time, working on a business a few days a week - i simply need to work full time, to pay down the debt on our home. So - career is not really going to be a focus this year.
One thing, though, that has been grabbing my attention lately is character in general, and positivity specifically. I’ve come to the conclusion that i need to become a positive/resilient person. Too much negativity has done me no favours, and it needs to stop - this year i’m going to have a crack at beating it.
I’ve been reading ‘How Children Succeed’ over the last week, and it talks about character qualities needed to succeed, such as: grit, self-control, zest, social intelligence, gratitude, optimism, curiosity, resourcefulness, resilience, ambition, professionalism, and integrity. Overall, these all make up good character. But i’m just going to focus on one: optimism (aka positivity).
Here’s the idea: becoming more optimistic will lead to being more resilient, reduce catastrophising, and deal with those depressed pity-parties we all have from time to time, especially us developers (i know what we’re all like!). The only problem is that i’m not sure how to become optimistic… i’ll start by talking to some close friends. Anyway, it’s worth a shot? I’ve got some crazy idea about how the world needs a ‘khan academy’ for lessons on positivity and character, but i think it’s just a crazy idea.
Part time
For the next month or two, i’ll be working part-time. Which leaves me thinking - what project can i work on part-time for only a couple months? I certainly can’t afford to work full-time all year, so my next contract will be full-time, so i need a project that’ll take about 12 days to complete. Maybe an iOS game?
I’ve been playing the game ‘Radiant’ on iOS lately. Lots of fun. Basically a space invaders clone, but with pretty neat glowing/retro/pixelated graphics. And then I saw their public sales numbers on Google Play: the range shown is 10-50k sales per month. That’s somewhere between 240k/year and 1.2M of revenue. And i can only assume that on iOS it’s higher. For an asteroids clone! Wow!
So i started experimenting, and found that I could replicate the graphics effects in code. So my idea is to spend my days off making a remake of a retro game, in a graphical style inspired by Radiant. I was thinking centipede or something action-y.
House
Good news! Our new builder started this week on our house. Carpenters are carpenting, port-a-loo’s are going up, roofing is soon to be installed, bricks are being delivered, terribly exciting. Except that now i’ve got bills to pay!
Reader
One more thing: Google is discontinuing Reader. So if you subscribe to my blog via RSS, maybe you should consider signing up to my email list instead now? The sign-up is at the top of my blog here!
You guys
Finally! I’ve got some stories of projects you guys are working on :)
Firstly, Sean Carpenter and his wife started a business doing web and app development. Here’s their first app’s description:
Menstruation Calendar Period! helps you keep track of your menstruation start days and lets you know when to expect your next period. It is simple to use, has no extra data to enter, and no annoying pop-ups. If you simply want to plan around your period and know when your period is late, this is the app for you!
Next, a mate has released the third chapter to his BeBee the Bee kids ipad game, extremely cool.
And finally, a guy called Joao has been working on a SaaS app with an iPhone companion app called Yodito. Sounds like exactly the business model I should be pursuing, right? Anyway, check it out.
Have a great week, all, and keep pursuing your dreams!
Thanks for reading! And if you want to get in touch, I'd love to hear from you: chris.hulbert at gmail.
Chris Hulbert
(Comp Sci, Hons - UTS)
Software Developer (Freelancer / Contractor) in Australia.
I have worked at places such as Google, Cochlear, Assembly Payments, News Corp, Fox Sports, NineMSN, FetchTV, Coles, Woolworths, Trust Bank, and Westpac, among others. If you're looking for help developing an iOS app, drop me a line!
Get in touch:
[email protected]
github.com/chrishulbert
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