Building Differently: From Commute-Coding To 1 Chance And A 15-App Portfolio

0:00Most apps, it's all about retention, right? And I made an app that, you know, is meant to be deleted. You know, you play it for 5 to 10 minutes, see where you're on the leaderboard, share it with your mates, and then you delete it, and you get on with your life. You know, life is short. So, I wanted to make a small experience that people could really enjoy and crack on with their lives. And I think I've managed to do

0:21that. Welcome to Launched. I'm Charlie Chapman and today I'm excited to bring you the prolific mobile game designer behind one chance word tiles and more. Taiwo Amish

0:35Taiwo, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. I am super excited. Uh we've we've come across each other many times over the years actually at this point, right? Yeah, we have. And I think every single time it's um in a different place under kind of like different circumstances, but it's always um really really cool to hang out in real life because I followed you for a long time on Twitter and you know what they say about like never meet your heroes or people that you look up to and stuff like that and you just keep

1:06you just keep coming back into my life. So um no no it's always always a pleasure, never a chore and um yeah, I'm super stoked to be here um today. I can't do this podcast without mentioning it. Uh, at the risk of becoming like the talk show and talking about baseball too much, one of my favorite things about you is we met in London. Uh, I don't think we really other than the internet, we didn't really know each other and came to the realization that you are a

1:32St. Louis Cardinals baseball fan. I'm a big big time fan and it's a small world. I love the um the emblem with the with the birds and yeah, like baseball like isn't a thing here in the the UK. So yeah, I was super stoked to hear that you're actually from there and yeah, just really really really cool. Small

1:51world. Oh yeah, I was you can imagine how excited I was that somebody's even heard of St. Louis, much less uh knows our our baseball team. Before we get too far into into that, I'll kick things off with the three questions I always ask to let everyone get to know you before we talk about all your mobile app games. And those three questions are where are you from? Do you have a formal education related to what you do? And then I want to hear about your career that led to the point of view making mobile game devs. Born and raised here in the UK in London. Do I have a formal education? So

2:24I studied interactive programming at an arts university. So, a little bit different. Um, so growing up, my two favorite subjects were always maths and art, which is kind of both ends of the spectrum. So, I thought I would do a computer science degree at an art university. And as you can imagine, uh there wasn't that many people doing the course. So, we got to know each other all very very well. And yeah, my final uh project was around accessibility in video games, something that I'm really passionate about. How did you get to the point from that to mobile game dev? I mean, it seems like it could be a short

3:01short step. Yeah. Yeah. But it's quite it's quite a long winding story. So, I'm going to give the short version of it. So, after I graduated, I was working for a grocery company here in the UK called Tesco in the bakery. Um, and then I moved to the head office and I was doing like various roles there, but my commute was 3 hours long. So, it was an hour and a half to

3:25get there, hour and a half to get back. So, I had three hours every single day to kill, um, 15 hours a week. So, I had quite a lot of time. And I decided to make an app. You know, I had an iPhone and I was really into, you know, love games and I thought, why not make an app? You know, use the skills that I got from uni, you know, watch some YouTube

3:46videos, buy a book and just make an app. So, I made an app. took me about six months to build. But as I was building it, I was also posting about it on Twitter. And I I I don't know. I think I just wanted to be held accountable. I think, you know, I just thought if I post about it, then I've got this, you know, history, you know, documentation, digital footprint of the things I was doing, so I could always look back into it. And also if I wasn't doing it, I would be held accountable. So it was kind of like twopronged. So I thought, let me let me do it. Let me just post

4:29about it and you know just kind of talk about small increments of progress I was making. Um so I built this in Unity. So it was on iOS and Android. And I loved the whole process. But I think one thing that it really taught me cuz my commute was so long, I would ask people on the train to play test the app. So when I had like a working version a couple of months in, yeah, I would go up to people on the train, you know, they would be having their downtime, you know, their moment of calm before. I was about to say I mean like I feel like a thing I

5:04hear often from people outside of the US but especially the UK when they talk about Americans is that when we're waiting for an elevator and me I'm the type of person that's like oh how you doing you just get this look like oh my god why are you talking to me? Yeah. Uh I feel like especially in a commute setting were people just kind of horrified or were people pretty like

5:24receptive to you talking to them? Do you know what it was a mix? I think initially people would always be really confused because it's such a a perplexing unique thing to ask. Hey, I'm building an app. Do you mind trying it? Because most people would think, you know, maybe you're trying to sell them something. Yeah. Trying to sell them something. But I was kind of like, here's my phone. Can you please play this game for 30 seconds and just give me some some feedback? But everyone I asked was, you know, really nice and would give really good feedback, you know, really honest feedback. You know, some person might say, "I remember this

5:59really vivid vividly." Actually, someone just said, "How how do I make it stop?" And I was like, "That's actually a really good cuz there was no pause." It was like you kind of just had to wait until you ran out of time. And I was like, "Okay, yeah, I need to add a pause like button into it." Yeah. I didn't hadn't thought about it. you know, I showed it to family and friends and they hadn't mentioned it. So, it was great to kind of get this kind of unbiased, you know, impartial feedback from people that I I didn't know and, you know, didn't have to be nice to me. And most

6:31of the feedback I got was critical, which was great. You know, I didn't want to hear. It's great because it wasn't great. It was really, really bad. So, I persevered with that. Released the app. And what was the app? I mean, it was a game, right? But what was this game? Yeah. So, it's called Space Bots. It's still on the app store. Um, so the first version took me about seven months to to build from scratch to kind of out in the app store. And a couple of years ago, I actually rewrote it just because, you know, the phones are just a lot better now. And it took me

7:04in Unity again or in Yeah, in Unity. And it took me uh a couple of days. And it just kind of showed the advancements of my of my skills from going from 7 months. And I tried to just upgrade what I had already, but I looked at the code and was like, I'm just better off just starting from scratch. So, I just started from scratch and it's just way

7:27more optimized, you know, way better. And it's got a special place in my heart because, you know, it was the first app that I made. It kind of started the ball rolling. Um, and then I got I got the bug and then I just kept making more and more apps. What was the actual release like? Like you got the bug. Was it because you were making money? You were seeing that real people were using it or just the sense

7:49of accomplishment from releasing it? I think it was all of the above. I think I released it. I got a Twitter DM from a guy from Italy actually and he said that there was a bug when you get to a certain point, you know, the the app would crash. And I just thought it was so amazing that someone in Italy, a different country, had downloaded my app, played it, and noticed this bug and then told me about it. I was just kind of like so blown away. I think the fact that you can come up with an idea. I've still got the post-it notes with like

8:25the drawings of me, you know, the drawings of the spacebot and how the app would look. And then, you know, after a couple of months, you can have it on the app store, you know, that still really kind of blows my mind. I barely made any money from it. It had one banner ad at the bottom of the screen. And I was using the ad platform called I ad. I got a check sent, which I never cashed just because it was like the first bit of internet money. It was like nothing. It might have been like $5 over the course of like a year, but just the fact that I

8:58had something out there that I could tell people, hey, you want to download my app, it's on the app store. So, huge sense of accomplishment and and pride. Um, so yeah, all of the above. The fact that you can release something, the fact that it's just an amazing creative outlet and that it could be enjoyed and

9:16used by people from around the world. That's awesome. So then you're still working at the little tiny mom and pop shop known as Tesco. You're now you're just like I want to make more of these games and put them out there just because it's an enjoyable hobby sort of. Exactly. Yeah. So I um I continued working there trying to kind of get into a more technical role. Um so I was working as a buyer so helping buy products for the stores in central Europe. and I just wanted to do

9:46something a little bit more technical. That uh didn't really go to plan. So, I left that position and then went to a company um an advertising company actually as an account manager. I applied for a technical job but they gave me a job as an account manager which surprisingly wasn't technical. So left that job and got my first proper like tech job working for a company called Unruly. They are an ad platform as well um based on the web but kind of

10:21looking to do stuff on mobile as well. So they were really interested that I was making these apps on the side that were using ad platforms. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So they were like this is really cool like you know we would love you to to join the team and it it was great because I could work on the projects on my apps and all the skills that I was gaining from that you

10:46know really helped the day job as well. So it was a really kind of mutually beneficial situation to be in and I learned lots you know the team was a great team you know learned a lot uh of really kind of technical things. What were you doing primarily there? Were you working on like SDKs for for the apps or is this like more on the

11:04back end? Yeah, so a bit of both actually. So my official title um was uh solutions engineer. So kind of working with different clients but also inhouse to build maybe like um a test platform to run an AR campaign. So maybe the user's got an iPhone that is got an AR compatible device. they could click on an ad for, you know, a furniture company and then drop a piece of furniture into their space to see how it would look like um in that space. So, hey, here's a advertisement for a sofa, but how does it look in your house? You know, just click this link and you can open up your

11:44camera and see how the sofa would look in your house. So, is that when you started learning like native iOS development? Nice little segue there. Um, so that was the time when I was learning Swift, you know, I was like, cool, you know, I want to learn Swift. I built an app called Who Am I? Just as kind of like a starting platform. I was like, I want to

12:04build an app that is really simple. What's the most simple thing I could do? Let's ask someone a question. Who are you? Is it a philosophical question? Is it like a question that's deep meaning? However you want to interpret that question, I was just asking people. As you can imagine, there was a bit of back

12:23and forth between the Apple review team. There were Yeah. Was it just one text box? Um, so it's a little bit it's a little bit more. So when you download the app and you go through the onboarding, it says, you know, this is the largest or hoping to be the largest digital exhibition kind of intertwining physical art and digital art. So when you download the app, you've got two options. You can answer the question, look at what people have said or look at a digital map to see where all the people that have answered is from. And most of the people that download it, they just have a look at what other

12:59people have said. But a lot of people take part in it. And after the app was released after about 6 months, I actually had an exhibition. So I had a physical exhibition in London where I had some iPads around so people that would just come in off from the street could come inside look at what other people said. So I would print out what people said with their picture and what they answered but people could take part and every single day in the evening I would print out all of the new ones and then replace those. So the next day so it was always an everchanging

13:34exhibition. every single day. What was the physical thing you were printing out? Were you like attaching it to like a sphere or something or like Yeah. No. So, it was it was uh I was printing it out on A2 paper. So, large sheets of paper and I was putting them inside frames. So, there was like 10 frames within the space. And every single day I just 10 people that took part that day would be the 10 people in

13:56the exhibition the following day. So, you have to rent out like studio space for something like that, right? or is this part of like some event with people you already knew? Like what are the logistics behind this? Yeah, so this was really interesting. So living in London, you know, a city with almost 10 million people, I thought this would be the least of my worries. I thought, oh, I'll be able to rent out a

14:19space really, really easy. Yeah, real estate famously very cheap in London. Yeah, exactly. I thought, oh, you know, no problem. Easy peasy. So I actually what I what I had done is I emailed all of the local authorities. So all of the different councils within London and the one that got back to me. So one So

14:41there's 30 something councils in London. The one that got back to me was the one that I actually live in which is fantastic. Great. So this is like a local representative for your like ward if you were in New York or something. Exactly. Exactly. So like I guess like you know Brooklyn, Queens, um you know all all the different burs. Um so there's 30 burs in in London. So I contacted my local burough and they said this is a fantastic idea. They were like this is great that a local developers made this app and they said I can use

15:14this space. So they gave me the space. They said I could have it for a week. I didn't have to pay for anything but under one condition. They said I had to host a class like an intro to programming class at the end of the week and I was like this is great. I love I love talking to people about apps and technology. Um so it was great. So I had the exhibition for a week. At the end I had an intro to programming class and about 20 people came to that which was great. But the age range was really interesting. The youngest person was uh

15:49seven and the oldest person was 81, which was amazing and loads of people had lots of questions. It was it was really really really cool. I feel like the the idea of going to a public class of some kind is something that people under the age of probably like 40 or maybe 30 like never experienced. You know what I mean? Like I wouldn't even think to look at a bulletin board somewhere or whatever, right? Like I think classes you take that are free are online, but you go to like when you go to an Apple store, you know how they do all those those sessions, you always see a much older

16:28crowd there. And I think it's because this idea of just like I want to get better at using the tool I have. It probably the same thing exists for weed whackers at uh Home Depot or you know, whatever. The idea of like going to a local place to learn from an expert directly is, I think, a super valuable asset that communities can have, but most younger people probably don't even know those exist. It was a real kind of um humbling experience to be honest to kind of see the reasons why. Like I think for maybe some of the more um mature in the audience, they wanted to

17:04learn because they wanted to keep up with like maybe grandkids, some of the younger people, you know, a lot of them would be interested in video games. It was kind of one of the reasons why I got into software engineering as well. So it it's great to kind of see the reasons why people want to learn a little bit more about software engineering. Um and it was cool. It was really really really great and the the council um were really

17:28supportive. for the the whole endeavor. And I'm pretty sure it might be the first app to have a physical exhibition, but I've got lots of pictures. I need to do something to kind of highlight and show the kind of exhibition. I took loads of photos and loads of videos. I just When was this? This would have been a

17:45while ago, right? Yeah. This would have been maybe 2018, 2019. Okay. Yeah. So, a couple of years ago, but it was it was great fun. Lots of people that I hadn't seen for a long time came through and yeah, it was it was a lot of fun. Ah, that's that is very cool. Okay, so you made that. I I'm guessing that was just there was no business model. That

18:09was just a free kind of art. No. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. More ads, no inapp purchases. Yeah. Completely free. At this point, you have uh you have a series of games that you've released, but and then they have ads in them, but like this is not, you know, coming close to being your full-time gig at this point, I'm

18:24guessing. Definitely not. No. So, yeah, all of the apps that I made. So, who am I? I believe was app number six. The previous five all been games. So, I had Space Bots, I had Space Bots, Match, Tik Tok Tap, Cube Sprint, and something else. I can't remember the number. I'm looking at your you you have quite a few of these are still available. Uh I think all all of all of my apps I haven't taken any of them, so there

18:54should be 15. But yeah, Space Bots, Spacebot Match, Cube Sprint, Tik Tok Tap, and then number maybe cuz multi-words is coming up. But that I feel like that was one of your bigger ones. Yeah. Yeah. That came a little bit came a little bit later. Yeah. At this stage, this is not just a little side hobby. This is this is more than that. So I'm curious like what's the

19:16transition to that point? Yeah. So it it all happened with my app that you mentioned right at the beginning, One Chance. So One Chance came out in 2020 and that was kind of like the year things really changed. 2020 was a very pivotal year, you know, a year that I think a lot of people are not going to forget. And so, yeah, I released an app called One Chance. Um,

19:41it does exactly what it says on the tin. So, you open up the app, it tells you that you can only ever play it once. There are 14 mini games that you play back to back. It'd be quit out of the app, you can't play it again. When you finish, you can't play it again. So you literally have one chance to play and then at the end your score gets uploaded to a leaderboard and you can see how you compare with people from around the

20:07world. And where did this idea come from? Like I'm just curious. Yeah. Uh great question. So the idea came from I was looking at the data from people playing my apps and most people would play it once or twice. You know, I would have the occasional couple of users who are like power users who really enjoyed what I made and would keep coming back, but the majority of people, you know, there's so many different games coming out, you know, from big studios. Why would anyone want to play a game made by um me and a lot of them were just kind of like experiments? So, I just said to myself,

20:44why don't I lean into that? you know, if people are only going to try my app once, why don't I make it a really, really cool experience and really put the pressure on and make it an app that you can literally only play once. So, it it stemmed from from from that. And did this also have ads in it? So, yes. So, the way this one was monetized is you play the 14 games, which normally takes between 5 to 10 minutes, and then you would see an ad before you got your results, which like as a just pure business model, a single ad impression per user

21:19would require a significant amount of users coming in to add up to any amount of money. Right. Exactly. Exactly. So, one complaint that I've never received from this app is about ads. for the many many people that have played it, no one's complained about the the singular ad that they see after playing for you know five to 10 minutes. So knowing that business model and then hearing you say that this changed everything, what happened when you

21:44released this app? So I released the app and you know every now and again I would check you know on App Store Connect just kind of like how many people have downloaded it. Do do you do a big like splashy launch or you just kind of pushed it out there maybe? Oh, I kind of So, two things actually. So, I released it on test flight and I posted it on the test flight subreddit and a lot of people actually got in touch. A lot of people said, "I really like the app." Um, you know, it's really cool. Thanks for making it. And I normally post my stuff

22:21on Test Flight, just on the Test Flight subreddit to get feedback. So, did this one feel different than the other games? Yeah, it felt different because a lot of people signed up to be beta testers for this and someone called Tony from Canada and I was looking at the scores coming through and I looked at the end of the day and it was Tony and he got you know 50%. And then it was Tony iPad and it was like 55%. And then it was Tony's wife's phone. And I just thought it was hilarious because this person Tony had just tried so many like every device. So I was like, maybe the

22:58fact that that's a good signal. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I was like, hm, you know, if Tony is like hunting for devices to play it on because he can only play it once, you know, maybe I'm on to something. And then one day I had tons of downloads from Germany. And I was like, this is really random. It's only

23:15in English, hasn't been translated. and I messaged a coworker who was based in Germany and I said, "Oh, do you mind having a look on the app store?" And he just sent me a screenshot and the app was like on the front page of like new games that we love. So I was like, "Wo, like this is this is never happened before." And then fast forward a couple of months, I got some correspondence from Apple. Someone from Apple said that they really enjoyed the app and if I was interested, would I be up for talking about the development process? And I was like, "Yeah, sounds sounds great." So,

23:54we had a conversation. They said to me, you know, we would love to get some professional uh pictures of you if you're up for it. You know, we're going to have our professional photographer. We can pick you up. We'll do your hair and makeup. And I was like, nah, I'm all right. you know, just because I don't like, you know, a fuss being made about me and anything like that. So, I said, you know, really appreciate it, but I'm okay. And I spoke to my mom. My mom said, "Wait a second. So, company want to want to pick you up. They want to do your hair and makeup. They want to take

24:26professional photos of you and you're saying no because of what?" And I was like, "Yeah, you're right." So, I I I messaged them back and they said, "Yep, not a problem. We'll sort it out." So had that which was like a surreal experience and then so you went to like a professional photo shoot basically professional professional photo shoot which was just really surreal. It was a whole day was like a day of you know different clothes and all of this kind of stuff. It was a whirlwind. And then a couple of months later, someone that I went to primary school, um, so I guess would that be elementary school,

25:02messaged me at half 5 in the morning and said, "It's so great to see that you're doing so well. I just saw you on the app store." And I was like, "This is like really weird." Like, you know, you just saw me on the app store. Is that not what you were expecting to happen eventually? To be honest, I think I just I really didn't know, you know, because on some like internal magazine or

25:25something. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Okay. I really didn't know where it was going to go. And then I opened the app store and then the first thing you see is me and I lit I actually just dropped the phone and I just burst out laughing because I was so emotional. It was just like all of these feelings and I just I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. This was like, you know,4 to 6:00 in the morning and I was just like in shock. It was like, you know, not even like games or whatever. It was like the

25:55today page. Yeah, it's the today page with the sort of the block that's dedicated to a story. And then it was an interview with you as well, right? So, it was like it wasn't just your picture. It was actually like talking to you about the app and the process. Yeah, it was it was a real kind of surreal moment to kind of go from the situation of making apps on my commute and for full transparency, I've never worked so the the job that I had um where I had the flexibility to work on that I was a solutions engineer and then I worked as solutions engineer

26:30for another company and then most recently I was working as a solutions consultant. So I've never worked as a software engineer like in my career. I've never worked as a, you know, so that imposter syndrome of like being on the app store front page talking about, you know, how to get into apps and games and talking about the apps and games that I've made for someone who's never professionally worked, you know, and who's had a lot of doubt was just kind of like really kind of confirming to me about this kind of crazy journey that I've been on. And I'd never received so many messages from friends and family

27:06and old teachers and old colleagues and yeah, everybody that's like, "Oh my gosh, I know that person." It was crazy. And it kind of just showed me the impact of the app store like cuz I make apps. I go on the app store quite a bit. But just I guess for the casual person, you know, to go on it and be

27:23like, "Wait a second, I know this guy." It was really really surreal. and yeah, like one of the the most um incredible kind of moments in my life. Um so yeah, so it was it was a very very special app at that point. You said that was a few months in. Was the app doing well? Like was there a lot of kind of users? I I guess it would all be new users coming in except for the people that are

27:48hunting up extra devices. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. No, the app was doing, you know, far greater than I would have ever imagined. And I think at that point it had hundreds of thousands of of people had played it. So, you would go on to the leaderboards and there'll be like hundreds of thousands of people on the on the leaderboard that had given it a go and like people would

28:08send me messages of group chats. That's the thing. the the sort of uh viral nature of it is I think kind of the the genius in that when you do it and you're done, the only thing you can do at that point is share it with your friends to see what they get. That's kind of the whole point, right? It's one of those uh I forgot what they call it, but the private social movement or whatever where everybody went from like Twitter into private DMs and stuff. That

28:37is probably where it spread the most. Like you don't have actual visibility into any of that. Exactly. Like the only visibility I have of that is when people send me emails saying, you know, you um destroy my marriage. Um yeah, I get a couple of those uh every now and again, which is, you know, very comforting to to hear. So uh super passionate. No, most of it is is very positive. and then, you know, went on to translate it into different languages cuz that was the number one piece of feedback I was getting from people that were playing it in around the world. You know, I really enjoyed

29:10it. But English isn't my first language. And if you're only going to have an experience once, you want to make sure that it's great for everyone. And a lot of the people that translated the app would just reach out to me on social media. I really enjoy the app. I would love to translate it into German or

29:27Spanish or Japanese or Korean or Danish. So, it's in loads of different languages now. I imagine it's easier than your than your other apps just by the pure nature of it's a very limited in scope game. The amount of copy has to be less than some of your other stuff, right? There actually is quite a lot of quite a lot of copy because there's like a flag

29:48game, so you need to choose the country. So, all of the countries need to be translated. There's also an animal game with all the animal emojis. So, all the animals need to be rather than it kind of being more like action based where it's kind of like just like move and fire. Each one of the 14 games, there is

30:05a bit of text and there is randomness. It's not set because I wanted to make the experience really varied. Even if someone managed to play on 10 different devices, the experience should be different for each one of those devices rather than the same. Um, so I put a lot of effort into that one-time experience. So then the the localization and and then especially like the Apple feature, did that accelerate things even even

30:34more? Yeah, 100%. So the I think the feature on the app store and then a couple of months later um it got game of the day um which was really really really cool as well, you know. So to go on to the the games tab and and see it, it's hard because the core gameplay mechanic is

30:55just the fact that you play it once. Yeah. The replayability, the retention is unsurprisingly very very poor. I'm honestly blown away by the the reception of the app and you know, people play it. Hundreds of people play it every single day. Do you see like spikes and then a tail as as sort of the the sharing mechanic works its way through new

31:17people? To be honest, it's it's pretty pretty stable. It's been stable for years, which is crazy. I wish it would make more money, but I'm I'm happy that people are en enjoying it. I think the the emails and the reviews left on the app store and the correspondence that people have shared like the the discourse with like group chats and stuff like that between friends and family and colleagues is just like this is so cool that I built this thing and people from around the world are enjoying it so much. And when I built it, it was never about the money. It was always about building something that um

31:55was a little bit different. you know, an app that you can only play once. That is like crazy because most apps is all about retention, right? And I made an app that, you know, is meant to be deleted. You know, you play it for 5 to 10 minutes, see where you're on the leaderboard, share it with your mates, and then you delete it, and you get on

32:12with your life. You know, life is short. So, I wanted to make a small experience that people could really enjoy and, you know, crack on with their lives. And I think I've managed to do that. Okay. So that that sort of brought in some amount of money that was real, but you're still probably not well, especially not once sort of the giant wave dies down. Not enough to let you quit your day job and make this a full-time thing. So how did you like what did you do kind of going from there

32:39then? Yeah. So after that app, I started making apps with subscriptions. So I made a game called multi-words and this is like a really simple word game. Um you know word games at that time. So this is 2023 were very popular. I released a a game called Thieword which is just my name with um RD at the end. And then I kind of made a better version of that called multi-words. And that was subscriptionbased. So it was my first subscriptionbased app. So it was completely free, but if you wanted like extras and to have no ads, you could pay a very small subscription fee to get the

33:26pro version of the app. And what was the thinking there? Cuz you had no ads in this one at all. The free version did and then the pro version didn't have the ads and also allowed you to do a couple of things. So you were able to shuffle the letters and you would get hints while the free version you didn't have that and you would see an ad at the end of the game session. So So what was the motivation for for

33:49adding the subscription in then? I guess I just wanted to try it out. Like I'd been so focused on just making um free ad supported experiences. I thought, you know, if people really wanted to support me, you know, a couple of quid every single month or a year based on a subscription to kind of support someone that they enjoyed using their apps. It was kind of like, let me see what happens. And I think the day it came out, a few people subscribed. I'm guessing it's like friends and family. I don't I don't know. And then one person subscribed in Canada. And then I was like, I don't know that many people in

34:26Canada. I've got some family, but I don't even think they know I make apps, so it's probably probably not them. And then I was like, hm, maybe I'm on to something like, you know, this experiment is, you know, maybe going somewhere. So, I kind of got the bug and then I released seven more apps after multi-words and just really enjoy making

34:48making games experiences. got the bug. Meaning like because you were already into making games at this point, but all of these kind of had a subscription model or like a hybrid subscription ad model kind of going forward. Did it work like kind of created a sustainable income for you? Yeah, I think it's really interesting

35:08because each one is like an experiment. You know, some are doing a lot better than others. So I released spacebots then spacebots match tick tock tap who am I tie word one chance 10 games quiz multi-words the number simple sedoku my journal and of the day um so 15 apps in total and I think after working on multi-words I fully lent into the hybrid model like you said free, but if you want additional perks or features, you would go for the subscription model there. And I think when I released my app called 10 games, which is a daily brain training game, it initially had 10 games. So, it will be

36:0410 games that you play every single day. This will be heavily um inspired by the brain training games on the DS which I really enjoyed when I was younger. So I thought I'd try and make one for the iPhone and iPad and people really enjoy that. So in terms of the apps, people really enjoy it. They play it every single day. There's a leaderboard so you can see how your daily brain age compares to people from around the world. And yeah, just kept taking small bets. So I released a Sudoku app called

36:37Simple Sudoku. I really got into Sudoku. So I was like, "Hey, want to I learn something new and make a Sudoku app and I really got into the weeds about um the algorithms for building um Sudoku puzzles, how to um classify an easy puzzle to a medium puzzle to a hard puzzle. um spoke to many different people on the Sudoku forums um which was really great to do as well and say hey I'm building this app what do you think and just getting feedback and then building a journaling app I got into journaling so I built an app called my journal and I use it every day to to

37:16journal so just kind of things that interest me and then just kind of like releasing it to the world and seeing if people enjoy it as well and I think it's it's just really really cool that it can go from idea to app store. You've mentioned before that like you are full-time indie now, right? Was there an app or an idea that got you to this point or was it kind of you're sort of building up this collection of apps that all have a decent amount of of users and kind of recurring income and then all of a sudden you look back and you go, "Oh,

37:48collectively this is kind of enough to sustain me at this point." Yeah, definitely. Um a combination of the two. So I think when 10 games came out last year, so it came out in 24 after a couple of months of that coming out, it got featured by Apple in the UK and Ireland and people seem to really enjoy it. I think in comparison to the other brain training games, it had a couple of unique points and I think one of them was, you know, there was a multiplayer game so you could play a game locally. So if you, you know, you had one iPhone and one device, you could

38:25play it together, which I think people really enjoyed. I think people really like the word and fact of the day. So every single day there's a word and a fact of the day. And that was really enjoyable to to research the facts and the words because I've always gone for more obscure words and like maybe lesser known English words. All of that

38:45together people really resonated with. So after a couple of months, I looked at how well the app was doing and I was like, hm, maybe maybe this has got some legs. And then releasing some other apps afterwards, like you said, all of these small bets that I had in total, I looked back and said, "Yeah, this is something that I think I can go fulltime." And it's it's super scary to kind of um go on this journey, especially after so many years of kind of doing, but I think it's the right thing to do because now I can put 100% of my my energy and my

39:22focus into this and growing this as a business, which is really really weird for me to even say because it doesn't feel like a business. It just feels like I'm doing something that happened to you. Yeah, exactly. and something that, you know, I don't see myself as a business person or, you know, anything like this. I just see myself as the nerdy guy who likes building stuff and turning my

39:43crazy ideas into apps. How has that changed things? I've I've heard people say like everybody, you know, works at a company and has this dream of going indie. And I've heard a lot of people say like you go indie thinking like, "Okay, now I can put all my time on it." and then you look back and you're like, I feel like I'm getting the same amount done I was before, but I'm just doing other things all the time. Is that your experience or do you feel like it really helped you

40:08accelerate? 100%. I think it's definitely helped me accelerate. So, in the year that I've gone fully indie, I've made four apps. So I made the simple sodoku at the beginning of the year which was a lot of fun to make and then I made an app called of the day which is like a daily learning app. So every single day you open it and you get a new fact a new words nature dog cat and most recently advice. So users can submit their advice to the app. So you can get a piece of wisdom or life hack or whatever from people around the world which is really

40:47cool. Oh, interesting. Is there a moderation issue there? Yeah. So I'm looking at all of the things that people send and so this feature came out a day ago. No one has sent a piece of advice yet. So the feature that is really really really popular is the pet of the day. So every single day I highlight a pet from around

41:09the world. But you're manually picking that. Yes, exactly. Yeah. So, people can upload pictures of their pets. In a world where everything is this sort of automated or or AI or whatever, there's something about curated experiences that is special in a unique way that's hard to replicate. Like just the knowledge that there's a human and at least most of your apps, you have an about page that has you and says who you are. So people, if they're invested, they know who you are. And knowing that this person picked this and is featuring it adds this layer that's that's hard to

41:45replicate. Yeah. Exa. Exactly. And I think what is really interesting on on that is whenever people send me a picture of their pet, I mean, they're always absolutely adorable. I'll email them back saying thank you for using it. The the number one thing that people mention is, "I can't believe it's just you." They assume it was some heartless corporation in like a random other place in the world. Exactly. Which is just crazy, but it's it's a really positive and heartwarming signal to me that people just say, "Wow, I can't believe you made this by yourself. Um, you know, I told my wife, husband, significant other, grandkids, whoever about this

42:25app. I love using it. I can't believe it's made by one person." So, it's really heartwarming to to to hear that, which is amazing. And then I followed that up with quiz. Um, which is just a really simple puzzle game where you get 10 questions. Everyone in the world gets the same 10 questions every single day and you get to see the leaderboard at the end and it's based on country. So you can see, hey, 50 people played in

42:49the UK and the average score was 70%. But hey, 100 people played in Nigeria and they got 80% or you know, 20 people played in South Africa. you know, it's and I think people really like the fact that it's the same 10 questions. So, you can compare and contrast against, you know, family members or colleagues. And it uses like all of the game center

43:12features, so activities and challenges. So, you get notifications when you beat someone on the daily challenge, which I think people really, really like. Most of your games, if not all of them, are very like native feeling. you're utilizing a lot of uh iOS features like you mentioned uh you're using widgets, they feel grounded in iOS. Is that a is that a choice from a like design perspective or is that more like you enjoyed working in Swift and so that's

43:40kind of where you naturally landed? Yeah, I think it's definitely the latter. I think I really enjoy working with Swift. So, you know, kind of going from UI kit to Swift uh and Swift UI, you know, has been really interesting, you know, for my own personal development and kind of seeing where I can go with gaming on a platform that isn't really suited for gaming is also like a really fun challenge uh for me as well. Like I really like Unity. I like the fact that you can export to both, but I move so much quicker um just using Xcode and Swift UI. So I think for the

44:20foreseeable um although one of the questions I get asked a lot is Android when question. Yeah, but as a oneperson you know team I think you know it makes sense to kind of just stick with one. um you know things might change in the future but at the moment I think you know this is this is where all my time

44:39and effort is is going to be. So like like we've said you have a lot of apps you've been building over a long period of time obviously and you even mentioned like you've learned a lot with each app that you can bring to the next to help you build faster or build better. But what about on the sort of the sort of business side of it? Are you thinking about that? Have you learned a better way to launch an app or a better

45:03way to grow an app after it's come out? Yeah, I think for me one of the things that I've learned the most is not being afraid to kind of talk and show the app. I think if I take of the day um which the daily learning app that I that I told you about and also word tiles my most recent app those apps have really leaned into kind of publicly talking about these apps more I think the last time I really had done it was with my first app spacebots which was you know many years ago now. So kind of leaning into that. And when you say publicly,

45:41you're talking about publicly promoting it while you're building it or Yeah. Like what what do you exactly mean there? Yeah. So, um talking about it publicly as I build it um on social media, but also creating content around the apps as well to kind of highlight to people, hey, I'm building this particular app. And I think one thing that's been like really helpful in that is social media because I can talk about of the day and I think of the day is a great example

46:15because when people see it, they get it. It's like okay, you swipe and then you get a fact. You swipe and then you get a recipe. You swipe and then you get a film. So it's a really simple app, but you kind of need to see it and then you're like, "Oh, okay. I download it and I get all of these things and I can pull it as widgets as well, so I don't even have to open the app. This is really cool. Like I don't have a lot of time, but I've got enough time to swipe and scroll through 25 different of the days. Amazing. And the same with word

46:46tiles. Um word tiles is a word game, but the the USP I think is the fact that you could play locally with up to 100 people. And I recently went out in London and different parts of the UK with a table and a banner and my laptop and I was building in public, but IRL, you know, literally building my app in public and people would download the app and then we would have a multiplayer session. You know, it might be a family, it could be a couple, it could be a group of friends, they would all download the app and then we would have a multiplayer game. you know, it could

47:23be up to six people all playing with the same words who can find the most words. And if they win, they win a prize. And it was great just to get feedback from people and they would take that experience and tell their friends, you know, I'd make content around it. And you've been doing this before just word tiles in some degree where on like Tik Tok or or reals you have a microphone and you're out in the world and you're like asking kind of quiz questions to people. Sometimes more directly connected to your app. Sometimes it's just like fun Tik Tok content

47:57and word tiles like you just described. You you'd set up a table and you were like demoing the app to people in real life and getting their reactions and everything. Obviously, just knowing you and watching you do this, you enjoy it. Like, it's fun, but it's also, I imagine, a lot of work. What is the main benefit you're getting to the app from this? Is it, do you think, like bringing in new users who are watching the content online? Is it about the people you're sharing it with in Lchester Square, however you say that, uh, in in London or in the subway or wherever where you're doing this or like what

48:35what's kind of the strategy or is it really just it's fun and then you see you're kind of just seeing what happens? Yeah, I think um, you know, I was nodding throughout you saying all of that because I think everything that you said is like I I really like it. I really like going out. Like, don't get me wrong, I'm, you know, I'm definitely an introvert, but I think in situations like that, I'm so passionate about apps that I love just hearing what people think about apps and like, you know, how they use their phones and, you know, what apps they hate and what apps they

49:08really like. So going out into the public with my microphone and asking people, I think normally people are quite quite surprised a to kind of like maybe talk to someone that works in the app space. You know, people use apps every single day. But then when you have the opportunity to talk to someone who does it full-time, you know, people often have a lot to say, hey, I really don't like the way this particular app does this thing. and asking people questions like, "If you could build an app, what app would you build?" You know, everyone's got an app in them. Uh, everyone's got an idea of an app that's

49:44going to change the world. So, I think that's really really cool. And I I really do enjoy it. It's a lot of work. You get a lot of nos and I think people, you know, friends and family who have gone out with me to help film and stuff like that say, "Wow, you know, you get a lot of people saying no." But the people that say yes and you know agree to talk and have a chat that just far outweighs you know the nos and like you know I don't take it personally like people

50:11have got places to go. But what's the main benefit you think you're getting from it? I think it's twofold. I think the number one thing people say back to me is like this is really interesting or I didn't know that this goes into it. Especially when I showed people the code when I was building in public, I would say all of this code is just to send a score to a leaderboard. And I'm like, wo, that's

50:36like a lot of code. So, you're kind of educating about what's going on behind it. Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, one view might have like, you know, 1,800 lines of code and they're like, "Wow, that's a lot of code." Just to, you know, just for a simple view and to break down kind of everything that's going on. But then the second thing is also the educational piece. Like every piece of content that I'm making and people see, more likely than not, people are going to be using their phone to consume this. So they're like, "Hey, this is an app that I'm consuming this and this is someone who builds

51:11something." It's like the kind of weird kind of meta behind someone making an app and seeing that on a device uh for that particular thing. So I think people also really enjoy that and you know the messages that I get from people basically every single day really confirms that people do like seeing this

51:32like a peak behind the curtain. It's kind of built up a following on is it Instagram or Tik Tok mostly? Both really. Both but mainly Tik Tok. Tik Tok. Okay. So like it's you're sort of building up a brand or whatever you want to call that on Tik Tok. Do you think that's feeding into the games

51:51then? Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. So, I can I can see that with written reviews on the app store and just the increase of numbers and I think you can also see it when you look at conversions because you know the conversion rate will be higher because people are searching for app. So, it'll be like okay well the conversion rate for this app is 80%. So clearly people are going onto the app store to look for this app. you know, the intention is there. So, I think it I think it definitely helps and once it's there, it's there forever. So, even though you might not see a spike of downloads

52:27immediately, you know, people will come back to it and see, oh, hey, you made this app called of the day and it seems really interesting or this is something that I think my partner would really like. I'm going to tell them about it. But what's interesting is, and maybe this goes, I know this is like a content strategy if you're trying to build a brand versus just a single video that takes off, but like a lot of the videos you don't really you're not really pushing an app. You're like having fun asking questions and maybe you're wearing a shirt that has your logo or you're at a table that has the logo and

53:01sometimes you are literally using the app like the Word Tiles ones, but even then they don't feel so much like they're ads for the app. itself. But I guess the idea is if people are having fun with it and then they're engaging with it more, then the more they just see the stuff, it's kind of like a it's kind of like a YouTuber who like monetizes their audience by releasing some products. It's like the YouTube channel isn't about the products, but it's like by that point they kind of enjoy the stuff you're doing and that's a way to sort of engage in another thing that you're

53:30doing. Exactly. I think that's exactly what I have always set off to to do. Like I think people downloading my apps and engaging with my apps is a byproduct. I think fundamentally I'm there to kind of educate and talk and kind of lower the barrier, get a peak behind the curtain of what app developers do. And because of that, because of the content that I've made online, I've been invited to

53:58go to schools, um, which has been great. So, I've been to schools all around the country and the feedback that I get from from parents that contact the school after their children have seen me talk or do a workshop is, you know, I didn't know my son or daughter could do something like this. you know, I didn't know that something like this is like, you know, a viable career choice and, you know, my child will not stop talking about this person that, which is which is awesome because I think when I was at school, I would have loved to have seen um, you know, someone talk about

54:32computers and games is really accessible. Like most people can play a game and kind of understand it. And when you show them the code and say, "Hey, this is the thing that makes the player move faster or this is the variable that makes the player jump higher," people can really get it. And they'll say, "Oh, hey, you know, if I want to make the

54:50player jump smaller, how would I do it?" And they'll change the number from 8 to four. And it's, "Oh, now they jump half as high." So people really get it. And it, for me, like I love video games, so making video games uh seems like, you know, to do it for a living seems a bit crazy, but here we are. So I think you know the the vision with the social media has always been to help educate and kind of highlight the the joys of making software but also the reality you know it's not all sunshines and rainbows and like for me it was app number seven

55:23you know that really kind of took off it's not going to retire me anytime soon. So I think it's always about being completely transparent, being open and honest about the realities of software engineering and app making. Um, and I think people really appreciate I think people appreciate someone being genuine. You know, a lot of people say I wear my heart on the sleeve whether that's a good thing or a bad thing. Uh, I'll let you be the judge of that. But I think people appreciate it. I think people really appreciate, you know, I'm not selling them a dream and saying this is the best thing ever. And, you know, it's

55:55going to be hard. like there's going to be ups and downs. You know, it's lonely as a, you know, independent app developer, but the community, the amazing community, you know, definitely makes it a good thing to be a part of, but I think people appreciate the, you know, being genuine, but also just the

56:11the educational piece as well. All I was told was ask him about the Harry Styles story and that is literally all I know. So, what what's the deal here? So, I was beta testing one of my apps um called My Journal and because of it, I was kind of going a different way to work. So, I was walking to work, but I thought, "Let me just go a different way." I was taking pictures and saying, "Oh, I really like this thing." And just writing in my journal. And then So, you're walking and typing in your on

56:40your phone. Yes. Yeah. Walking and typing and taking pictures and recording audio. Just like putting the app through its paces. And then I turn around and then I see someone who looks like Harry Styles. So I say, "Hey, Harry." And he looks at me and then takes out He's listening to music. He takes out one of these headphones and was like, "Sorry." And I was like, "Oh, sorry. Really sorry to bother you." Just saying, "Hey." And I really like the song as it was. And then he took the other headphone out and was like, "Oh, thanks. Thanks." And he was like, "Oh, what what are you up to?" And

57:16I was like, "Well, actually, I'm a software developer and I'm actually trying out my app." And he was like, "Oh, cool. What's the name of the app?" So, I said, "My journal." And then he got his phone out and went on the app store and I was like, "Oh, it's not out at the moment." And he said, "Oh, what's it about?" And I told him what it was about. And I was like, "Oh, do you want to give it a go?" So, he gave it a go and was like, "Oh, I really like the the colors and what you've what you've done here." And unbeknownst to me, so we was

57:39talking for a couple of minutes at this point and then I said, you know, one of the things on the app is all about like, you know, giving advice. Like if you could give advice, like what would it be? And he gave me two pieces of of advice and I think they're both really important and if I can share them with the listeners of of Launch, I think it'll be really cool. So the first thing he said is it's better to have hard conversations because you'll have an easy life. But if you want a hard life, you have easy conversations. And you know, I kind of took a step back and was

58:14like, you know, really, and he gave some examples of having difficult conversations, you know, it's difficult at the time, but in the long run, your life will be better for it, but if you kind of keep things, you know, sweep it under the carpet and don't really talk about these big things, in the short term, you might have an easy life, but

58:30these things always come out at the end. So it's better just have the difficult day today and then in the future things will be better then you know kind of and I was like you know I think that's solid advice and there was something on my mind that I was like you know putting off and I was like oh I should just do it and then he said another thing that is I think really important and especially like you know in today's world and he actually put this on the app so I was like oh you know do you mind just putting this as a journal

58:58entry and he did so he recorded um saying catch people being good. And what is meant by that is to tell people when they're doing cool stuff like you know he was like normally we tell people hey you know well done or congratulations or give people thanks on particular milestones so maybe getting married having children buying a new place getting a new job but he said we don't do it enough. Why does it have to be at those particular things? why can't you just call someone that you haven't spoken to in a while and say, you know, thank you for being my friend or you know, thank you for getting me through

59:34this hard time or I appreciate you being in my life. And he was like, is there someone that you haven't spoken to in a while? I was like, there's a few. And he was like, call them up. I was like, what? He's like, give them a call right now. Tell tell them how much you love them. And I was like, oh, okay. And then at this point, I was like, I'm really

59:51sorry. You probably got places to be. And he was like, no, I'm just on my lunch. But at this point there was like a big group of people just watching us uh talking in the street and then he gave me um his contact details said um when the app is out let me know I'd love to download it. We had a hug and then we departed ways um and it was just a very

1:00:13wholesome nice meeting. That's so crazy. It's also an incredibly tie kind of interaction, right? Like I know that this is supposed to be a story about Harry Styles and how down to earth he is or something or maybe not down to earth, how elder wisdom or whatever, but I hear that and I think like yeah, that would happen to you. Like you're a person that people want to talk to and I know you probably don't feel that because you're used to strangers being like why are you coming at me with a microphone and walking away? But like I think you can only get away with the thing you do

1:00:48because you're so approachable I guess is is the thing. Like you are fun to talk to and not intimidating to talk to. That is very kind. Thank you so much. And like honestly that's music to to my ears. And to to be honest, I really like talking to people and getting to know people. And you know, I told people about it and they were like, um, oh my

1:01:12god, like how did you how did you do it? And like I guess when you enjoy doing it, it doesn't seem like a chore. You just kind of I don't even think about doing it. You know, he's a very busy person. I didn't realize how many followers he had across social media is actually quite insane. You know, we had a conversation for like 15 minutes on on the street and it's no different from the conversations that I have with people talking about apps. And I think what was really cool about it was just, you know, probably questions that he doesn't get asked a lot if if ever

1:01:47because, you know, when you kind of take a step back and you really think about it, he was giving me some like unsolicited like advice as well, which is really cool to kind of like, oh, actually there was this other thing as well, which is just really cool. you know, it really kind of shows that a he cares about the question that I asked, but also like the the time cuz I'm sure, you know, when I said I'm sure you've got places to be, he probably had places to be. But um it was a really nice kind of moment and yeah, it's very very nice

1:02:16guy. But yeah, no, he he recorded that. It's on my app, my journal. Um yeah, top bloke. One of the things with this whole show is I tend to be just as interested in the the leadup to the to the app itself as I am the app itself because I like to think that a lot of people out there listening right now are all along this this journey, right? So there's plenty of people that are like they've released multiple apps, none of them have taken off and they're like I guess this isn't for me. But like you were how many apps in and that would have been

1:02:50exactly where you were. And then there there's definitely people that I've had on the show that the first app they make somehow catches viral and then they're on this crazy roller coaster. Like everybody's journey is totally different. But I think that's a good thing to hear both for somebody who's in that phase where they think things aren't working and also somebody who's wanting to get into this to be like you're not just going to throw something out there and just start reaping all these millions of dollars. Like that's

1:03:17not that's not really how this works. Personally, I love hearing everybody's different stories coming in. And so that that's kind of ultimately what the show is about. Even though the the launched in the in the title usually happens maybe halfway through the show if we're lucky. I think that's just just as fun of a story. But then, you know, everything that happens afterwards obviously obviously is good, too. We are at about time here and I want to make sure we have time for uh for the question I I always end this show with which is uh who's a person or people out there that have inspired you and your

1:03:48work that you want others to check out. So I have um a couple of people. Um so number one is a guy called Shan um Shan Donnelly. He is an incredible app developer. He's uh at Personal Best is a great fitness tracker. I think he really leans into best practices when it comes to Apple. Um I think the app is really polished. It's helped me on my fitness journey as well and he's just a top look. So um you know he inspires me and pushes me to you know be a Ben app developer. So definitely if you have a chance check out personal best. Um I

1:04:27think another person is Lena Stockton. Um she is a developer in Germany. She won uh Swift Student Challenge a couple of years ago. Yeah, I met her at uh WWDC. Oh, good times. Yeah, super talented um app developer. Just crazy crazy crazy talented. And then um lastly, Josh Newton. um he released an app called Orbit um which is a subscription tracker but he is a designer and then moved into app development and you can just see that in his app orbit because it just is very very beautiful. Um so your subscriptions are like little moons around your planet so you can see visually wow I've got a lot of

1:05:14subscriptions I need to cut back. So putting all of my subscriptions into that app has saved me a lot of money. So, uh, thank you, Josh. And it just like it's just beautiful to look at. You know, something as mundane as subscriptions. Uh, he's made it look very, very beautiful. So, they're just a few people. I think a lot of people inspire me, but yeah, it's a hard

1:05:32question to answer. No, that's that's perfect. Awesome. Well, uh, thank you so much for for, uh, coming on. It's always a delight to get to hang out with you and, uh, it's good to finally do that in in recorded form. Honestly, it's been an absolute pleasure. Um you are a absolute legend and it's been um a fantastic experience.

1:05:53Really appreciate you having me on. Awesome. So where can people find uh you and your work? I am Taiomi. So that is T A I O M I. So the first three letters of my first name and the first three letters of my surname um at most places. But um you can just go to tyomi.com as well and you can find out all my information and links to socials. But I'm tight OMI on

1:06:18most platforms. Awesome. Well, thank you again for coming on and uh I'll see you somewhere else in the world uh in the future, I'm sure. Maybe at uh St. Louis game. H that's the dream, man. You got to you got to come come to Bush Stadium. Okay. Okay. And then you can come to um

1:06:35Sus Park to watch a Crystal Palace game. Ah, that is more the dream if I'm being honest with you. Uh we got to we got to make that happen. We got to make it happen. We'll make it happen. We'll make it You heard it here first. We'll make it happen. All right. All right. Yeah. All right. Well, I will uh I'll see you sometime in

1:06:50the future. Definitely. Take care. You too. Thank you so much for listening. You can find more Launched at launched fm.com and you can find me on pretty much all the social medias. I'mchyc on Twitter or charliemchapman pretty much everywhere else. And of course, huge thanks to Revenue for making this episode and all future episodes of launched possible. I'll see you all

1:07:15again in two weeks.