Freelancing Is Not A Shortcut to Product Freedom

Yeah I was going to post the same thing. I specifically work with e-commerce store owners (Shopify dev here) and seriously every day I get asked to implement features into Shopify that don't exist currently. These are paying customers that will gladly pay an app $X / month for these features, but they don't exist.

That's why my next project is to start developing Shopify apps :)

Without freelancing my 'indiehackers' career would not exist.

Appreciate the feedback. I agree. I call it a good 'pre-step' to bootstrapping a product in the post.

I do think you can also learn a lot about a specific industry by taking a full-time job at a company and gaining some experience that way. The risk of course is if you find out later that you do not like the work/industry, it might be harder to leave. So, to your point, freelancing is a great way to 'test' a market by trying a project and seeing whether you like the industry. If it doesn't work out, you can always take another client/project.

Great point. We are very fortunate and that is important to remember. Thanks for the reminder. :)