Discovering the potential of a project while you work along

When you've got an idea and let's say you're looking for a co-founder, you're often put in the position of selling it. Or making the case of how it would be used. Before I've actually started building the product I'm already thinking about pitch decks.

But I've often found that delving into work is often much more rewarding. You can actually discover the product. What it does best. What you thought would work but doesn't.

MVP mentality is often interpreted as 'find your market first'. Yeah, the market is important. But every project I see being built nowadays is centered around the idea of getting a product to market. And that product is an Airtable or Notion board, or some meta-newsletter about how to build a product.

I'm a designer. Learning React, Next.js, and using Tailwind to walk myself through ideas that might work. Many of them don't. And I find that out after I start building them. I might pivot some. But I find joy in doing this. What I don't find joy in is sticking to one and BAM, that's my side project. I now have to find people to partner up and sell it to. Think about vesting schedules, how to scale, promises I make, etc.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say here is that I hope we can come back to hacking stuff for the fun of it. Designers working with devs and copywriters and marketing nerds and product managers just for the sake of it, without any major expectations.

I'm thinking of starting a showcase of what I'm making. And if you guys have other examples of places enabling this feel free to drop links. And thoughts.