How I made $10 from a blank web page

This is by no means super impressive, but I'll count it as a win anyway.

After suffering through a year of lousy Zoom video calls, I noticed that one of the biggest issues I faced was poor lighting. So, I forked out some cash for an Amazon ring light, but it wouldn't fit on my desk. What I did notice, however, was my Macbook actually emits a fair amount of light on its own. So, what I would usually end up doing is opening MS Word with a blank document and max out the screen's brightness to light up my face.

That's when the idea hit me-- How about I just make a web app that does this for me? That's when I searched for cheap domains and created https://ringlight.studio.

It started off as a totally white screen, and I'd just navigate to the site before my Zoom calls. It burned my eyes a bit, but my calls looked way better!

I asked some friends for feedback, and some suggested I put a black circle in the middle so it doesn't hurt as badly. Sure enough, the videos still looked great.

I did some very minimal marketing (word of mouth and a couple of Tweets), and it turns out people actually liked it. Some friends became active users, and after I put a Buy Me A Coffee button on the page, I got $10 in donations!

Although I've added a few features here and there, there's next to no complexity behind this site. All I did was solve my own problem, and some people seemed to like it.

Wins/takeaways:

• Nothing is too simple as long as it's helpful
• ~20 visitors per month only from word of mouth
• $10! (recouped domain registration fees)

Check it out yourself:
https://ringlight.studio