#004 - Why Is Sharing the Work So Much Harder Than Doing It?

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I know it has been a while. The last log was about releasing the planner, and since then I have been working on a digital version: an iOS app.

I have been building it for about a month now. Features have been added, ideas have changed, and quite a few evenings have disappeared into code. But I have not made any new logs. I have not written any small blog posts, and I have barely shared anything on social media.

The work continued. The part where I talk about the work did not.

And that keeps playing in my mind: why is it so hard for me to create content about the things I am already doing?

The uncomfortable part

There are two parts to it.

The first is simply that recording myself still feels uncomfortable. That is true when it is only my voice, and adding video makes it even more noticeable. I am trying to get over that hurdle by doing the video anyway.

But the bigger discomfort is the question running in the background: what will people think of me when they see this?

I do not mean strangers on the internet as much as people closer to me. Coworkers, potential clients, and other people who know me professionally. What happens when they see a log, hear the podcast, read a post, or watch me talk into a camera about something I am building?

Realistically, probably not much.

Still, it is surprisingly easy to turn that question into a reason not to publish anything.

There is useful feedback, of course. If the video quality is not good or the sound needs work, I want to know. The office still has quite a bit of echo because it is not fully furnished yet. Those are things I can improve.

But worrying about how someone might perceive me simply because I am sharing the work? That is something I need to let go.

I like building, not “creating content”

The strange thing is that I have no problem doing the work itself.

I love building things. I can spend an entire evening working through ideas, features, and code while the kids are asleep and my wife is busy with her own webshops. That part comes naturally.

Then I have to write or record something about what I built, and suddenly everything slows down.

What should I talk about? Should I make tutorials when there are already thousands of tutorials? Should I document the journey instead? If I build several features in one evening, does each feature need its own post? Should I make a weekly summary? Does every update need a video, a blog post, and a social post?

That is usually where the overthinking starts.

And the result of all that thinking is that I publish nothing.

Where are you even supposed to post?

The second part of the problem is that the internet used to feel simpler.

There was Twitter. You posted a thought, found like-minded people, and had conversations. Instagram was for visual things and stories. LinkedIn was where you announced a new job or client.

Those lines have blurred.

Now there is X, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, Instagram posts, Stories and Reels, LinkedIn, YouTube, podcasts, blogs, and more specialised places such as Game Jolt or itch.io. Even a simple textual update could be posted in five different places before thinking about video or audio.

So which one do you choose?

And then there is another split. Content about the process might be interesting to other developers, but content intended to reach users belongs somewhere else entirely. The people who build games are not necessarily in the same places as the people who play them. The same applies to iOS apps and web products.

It starts to feel as if every project needs two content strategies across ten different channels.

That might make sense for someone whose goal is to become a full-time content creator. It is not my goal. I want to build things and have fun doing it.

An audience is not really the goal

The last couple of logs had no podcast listeners and only a few views on YouTube. That is fine. This is only the fourth log, so there is no real audience yet.

And building a large audience for the sake of being big on the internet does not interest me very much.

What does interest me is feedback.

When I released the planner, I wanted people to use it and tell me what worked. I wanted to hear what they liked, what they did not like, and what might make it better. The same is true for the iOS app and the other things I build.

But to get that feedback, people first need to know the work exists.

That is the contradiction I keep running into. Content creation is not the goal, but sharing is still part of the process. It creates the chance to meet people who care about the same problems, might use what I am building, and can help me see things I would otherwise miss.

Maybe what I want is not really an audience. Maybe it is a small community around the work.

Making it smaller

I do not have a complete solution yet.

Maybe I should choose one text-based platform instead of trying to be everywhere. Keep LinkedIn for the more professional side, use Instagram Stories for quick visual updates, and write smaller blog posts when a subject deserves more room.

Perhaps the answer will be different for each project. I still need to investigate which platforms actually suit what I am trying to do.

For now, though, the most important thing is probably to stop turning every update into a complete content strategy.

The iOS app is moving toward its first release. I gave myself this week to finish the features I still want in the initial version. It goes a little beyond a minimum viable product. I think I am aiming more for a minimum lovable product, while still making sure I learn from what I am implementing.

There is plenty I could have shared along the way. I cannot go back and publish every missed update, but I can start again here.

This log is unscripted, somewhat rant-like, and probably less structured than it could be. But I wanted to break the cycle of postponing it again. So I turned on the microphone and camera and said what was on my mind.

Maybe that is enough for now.

If you are listening, watching, or reading, thank you. Let me know what you would like to see from this journey, or whether there is anything I could improve about the logs themselves.

I will catch you in the next log.