Indie Hacker Diaries #36: All Hail The Content Cycle

I’ll jump to the punch line: I’ve decided to hit pause on Indie Hacker Diaries for the next couple of months.

Right now, I need to focus as much attention as I can on the projects I’m trying to ship (specifically: Mod, a new CheatCode site, and a public beta for Joystick’s deployment service, Push).

I’ve been fighting with myself about this for several weeks now. I don’t want to appear to be quitting or “hiding,” but I’ve realized that one of the most destructive social ills of our time is the “content cycle.”

A never-ending stream of stuff, often to the point of nausea, designed to keep us distracted from the more meaningful parts of life. Like gerbils, we’re conditioned to amble over to the push bar on the pellet feeder and wait anxiously. We’ve convinced ourselves this is progress, but if we’re honest, it’s the very poison that’s intoxicating us into a coma.

Anybody who’s followed my work or writing for the past decade and change knows that I go through cycles where I get quiet. I’ve been like this since I was a kid. Sometimes I want to talk (because I have something to say), sometimes I don’t (because I don’t have much to say).

On its face, this seems like a reasonable position. Admirable, even. But in the post-social media era we find ourselves in, many all-too-eager marketing types will tell you that it’s a death sentence to deny the machine its tithe. If you don’t feed the machine, it will see to your imminent destruction. Sie erstellen den Inhalt! Dienen Sie dem Algorithmus!

Pardon my Français, but fuck that.

My focus has and will continue to be on quality. The reason I’m so dedicated to quality is that, in my research into quality-thinking (i.e., the professional practice of quality assurance and engendering quality-thinking into a company’s culture—an all but lost art shepherded by great minds like Joseph Juran), it’s clear that is the mindset where the best results come from.

Quality might mean a lot of things to different people, but from what I’ve learned (and personally believe), quality is an attitude of dedicating the time necessary—whatever that may be—to produce a useful result that actually works. The purpose being to silently communicate to customers that you respect their time, money, and attention.

Think about the 1970s refrigerator in your tactless uncle’s garage-turned-mancave that’s kept beer ice cold for 40 years without a hiccup. The personal, handwritten letter from a company’s founder thanking you for a sale. The independent record label tossing a Laffy Taffy into the box with the record you just bought.

In essence: giving a damn, personified.

This means a lot to me because I find it deeply frustrating to see our manufactured world decaying. To me, the reason is obvious: everything (now) is driven by short-term thinking. Cheap, cheap, cheap! Buy now, pay later! All hail the deadline!

It’s a race toward oblivion.

Whatever the excuse, we all see it. We all feel it. Things are broken. And they’re broken because we’ve—generally speaking—replaced the will to care with the will to produce. The more-considered, patient spirit that built the vehicle we’ve been living off the fumes of for decades now is all but lost.

But it doesn’t have to be.

From my humble little perch in Tennessee, I hope that what I’m writing and what I’m building will influence others to say “you know what, he’s right, I don’t want to ship junk anymore.” Hopefully, the results I produce can act as a guidepost toward safety and sanity in the algorithmic hurricane we find ourselves being swept away by.

In service of this mission, for the next couple of months, instead of reading or listening to this newsletter, the main way to make sure I haven’t gone full Howard Hughes is to follow me on LinkedIn or Bluesky. When it makes sense, I’ll be posting brief updates and sharing any wisdom I think you might find useful on those pages. I’d also encourage you to star Joystick on Github to keep an eye on progress there as I’ll be pushing code pretty regularly.

But for now, I bid you a temporary adieu.

P.S. If the above resonates with you and you know someone who might enjoy it, please share it.