Why my CineMit initiative failed

What is CineMit ?

CineMit is a meet-up cinema app. People can search film showtime, add the event in the home and the other can join it to talk in group chat and organise the meeting directly at the cinema.

I started to build this project in November 2023, after my degree in computer science. At that moment I was completely lost and I wanted to do something great, but I didn’t even experience, so this project was my excuse to learn something. I started completely from scratch, I helped myself with some AI tools to understand concepts and improve my web research.

So I worked on :

• Front-end

• Back-end

• Database

• Website

• Social media pages to give it strongest identity

• Deployment of app and server

I was “CEO”, developer, support, social media manager etc, at the same time !

This project was doomed to fail

Everybody care about my project, a lot of people supported my idea and there were no app like CineMit, so dedicated to cinema. So how is possible to fail?

I can’t give you special recipe to succeed, but I have some ingredient to fail recipe!

Working alone

Working alone is my recurring mistake.

My problem is that I work very well in groups with people I connect with, but otherwise I'm incapable of working with others. This was my project, and I wanted to build it the way I envisioned it. When I realized I needed people, I tried to talk about it, but no one felt motivated to participate, so managing everything alone while working was impossible.

So I think you don't have to be afraid of other people, but involve them !

Little investment

Be careful here, it's not the amount that counts.

Financially, I paid about €6 a month for a VPS and €12 a year for the website domain. It's affordable for anyone, really. The problem is the overall investment.

I didn't believe in it, I didn't invest in advertising, I almost never showed up at events to advertise, I never looked for investors, and I never really thought about a way to grow my app. I was looking for casual virality, for someone important to like my idea and that's a goal, but it doesn't work that way. I didn't even publish my app on the app store because it costs €100 a year and I didn't feel it would be worth it.

Not a strong communication on social media

Social media communication is crucial today.

I've seen projects like CineMit grow much faster thanks to good use of social media. I've created different types of content and experimented, but even here, loneliness got the better of me. Doing good work takes time, and it's really difficult to manage everything on your own. I had a page on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and LinkedIn. I think social media is indispensable, using it doesn't guarantee success, but not using it guarantees failure.

Don't worry about code quality from the start

This is something I've underestimated.

Sometimes I'd leave things that worked as they were, even if the code was messy, with oddly named variables, lots of indentation, and, more rarely, copying and pasting code fragments. Today, on some problems I had, opening the code and looking at it was really frustrating. Making a small change took me far too long compared to what it should.

We can use this formule: project that no one uses + bugs to fix = lack of motivation

Unclear targets

The target audience is basic for an app.

My target audience was film buffs. Since it was difficult to show niche films, they became people who go to see mainstream movies. Then, having moved from Italy to France, I opened my doors to the French.
So, what language do I use for communication? I'm not a film buff, and that didn't help me, but in Europe, where every country speaks its own language, using English isn't the best option. English, besides not being widely understood, touches people's emotions much less, so it becomes really difficult to be attractive. I could have written posts in both languages, but having too much text also makes it boring, and it's harder to have good design using two languages. There are alternatives, but obviously, working alone becomes a nightmare.

Fear

Fear is the last ingredient. I was afraid, but afraid of success.

Working on the technical side is a bit like playing with Lego, but when you think your app might work, that someone will give you the chance to explode, that things will finally work, an unconscious fear triggers self-sabotage.
The reason I never dared to push was the anxiety of how I would handle things. What if my system couldn't handle those people? What if someone sued me for policy issues? What if I became a laughingstock? Imagine presenting your app and someone loudly interjects, "We're not interested!" I imagined the worst-case scenarios, even though I know it's often just overthinking, but somehow this stuff held me back.

The main question I asked myself was: if it worked, I'd have to spend money, but without getting any return. How will I manage?

So where I am now?

The app still exists, but I've taken a step back.

I informed the testing channel that the concept was changing, I cancelled the VPS subscription, and I packaged the front-end and back-end so it's easy to deploy the app again. The app is still available on the Play Store, I only kept the search function while I was waiting to come up with a new concept. I considered publishing the code on github, but at that point, any source of income is excluded, the app becomes intellectually public domain in this case.

Conclusion

The concept seems interesting, but after much research, I realized it's an idea that has never worked. I've found numerous remnants of projects like mine, almost all abandoned, and what seems to work clearly struggles to attract a significant audience. This is why there's no single point of contact for movie theater encounters, something that exists in other contexts: Tinder for love, BlablaCar for carpooling, Strava for runners, etc.

Thanks to this project, however, I learned a lot. I'm satisfied with the work I did.

P.S. I have a great friend who helped me create the logo, an essential part of this project's identity. Thanks, Luca!