I used to post the roadmap. The coming-soon screenshot, the "building something new" teaser, the thread narrating a feature I had not finished. It felt like momentum. Building in public, the advice everyone gives: share the journey, bring people along, market as you make.
I stopped. Not because visibility is bad. I publish more now than I ever did. I stopped because I had the sequence backwards, and the sequence is the whole thing.
Building in public, as most people practice it, means narrating intentions. You announce the thing before the thing exists. And announcing has two costs that nobody mentions in the "share your journey" advice.
What building in public actually rewards
The first cost is internal. Posting about the work lights up the same reward the work does. You write the announcement, the likes come in, and your brain files it under "made progress today." But you moved nothing. You can run this loop for weeks, feeling productive, shipping tweets instead of software. The narrating competes with the building for the same hours and the same dopamine, and narrating is easier, so narrating wins.
