> In the last two weeks, at least five near-identical apps have appeared on the App Store.
This has always been a problem, TBH. I completely stopped releasing anything on any store after my first experience on Android, where I created an actual novel approach to a personal problem experienced by many, and found clones within the first month of it getting traction.
That was in 2014!
> My app's value is its simplicity. In an environment where simple, successful ideas can be replicated this quickly, what is the moat? Is it brand, speed of innovation, marketing, or something else?
"Something else", but I don't know what that could be other than "marketing dollars".
I'm struggling with this right now, having a (what I think is) a novel approach to using LLMs in a way that improves the practical performance on complex tasks while simultaneously reducing tokens[1], but it's such an obvious approach that it can be replicated by a CC-driven process in (probably) a week or so, for the cost of a $200/m subscription.
So until I have some idea of how to proceed in a manner that lets me retain whatever customers I can get from cold-start, I've put my release on hold and simply use it myself for now.
My best idea thus far (and probably what everyone will be doing soon), is to engage individual businesses and sell only enterprise licenses of this.
This doesn't make the problem go away, but it means that a truly useful product will be under the radar to at least make back some of the development cost before clones appear.
Two other things to keep in mind:
1. Posting on HN used to be a good way to get traction. That is no longer the case - your idea will be shamelessly vibe-coded and marketed to an already collected and curated set of leads before the discussion is even archived!
2. The traditional startup advice about release early+often then iterate on PMF no longer applies: as you asymptotically approach PMF, the clones are going to be only a few hours behind you. Todya, as things stand, I dare not attempt to find PMF in public - it will be done with my carefully curated list of leads, privately.
==========
[1] No, it's not caching!
This has always been a problem, TBH. I completely stopped releasing anything on any store after my first experience on Android, where I created an actual novel approach to a personal problem experienced by many, and found clones within the first month of it getting traction.
That was in 2014!
> My app's value is its simplicity. In an environment where simple, successful ideas can be replicated this quickly, what is the moat? Is it brand, speed of innovation, marketing, or something else?
"Something else", but I don't know what that could be other than "marketing dollars".
I'm struggling with this right now, having a (what I think is) a novel approach to using LLMs in a way that improves the practical performance on complex tasks while simultaneously reducing tokens[1], but it's such an obvious approach that it can be replicated by a CC-driven process in (probably) a week or so, for the cost of a $200/m subscription.
So until I have some idea of how to proceed in a manner that lets me retain whatever customers I can get from cold-start, I've put my release on hold and simply use it myself for now.
My best idea thus far (and probably what everyone will be doing soon), is to engage individual businesses and sell only enterprise licenses of this.
This doesn't make the problem go away, but it means that a truly useful product will be under the radar to at least make back some of the development cost before clones appear.
Two other things to keep in mind:
1. Posting on HN used to be a good way to get traction. That is no longer the case - your idea will be shamelessly vibe-coded and marketed to an already collected and curated set of leads before the discussion is even archived!
2. The traditional startup advice about release early+often then iterate on PMF no longer applies: as you asymptotically approach PMF, the clones are going to be only a few hours behind you. Todya, as things stand, I dare not attempt to find PMF in public - it will be done with my carefully curated list of leads, privately.
==========
[1] No, it's not caching!