What I Learned Building 2 Side Projects in Public

The Real Lesson

I spent 6 months building in solitude before I understood: code quality doesn't matter if nobody wants the product.

Here's what building Swipe Cleaner and Paper List taught me:

1. Watch Users Before Writing Code

For Swipe Cleaner, I watched 10 friends manage their camera rolls. Every single one had the same workflow: take 100+ photos per event, never delete anything, run out of storage at the worst possible moment.