Developing Perspective David Smith

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I am delighted to announce that today I am launching a new development related podcast with Marco Arment. It is called Under the Radar and starts today on the fine Relay FM Network.

I have been doing Developing Perspective since July 13, 2011 (roughly 4.5 years). During that time I have chronicled the rises and falls of being an independent developer in the App Store. I am immensely proud of Developing Perspective and glad that I have it to refer to later on as I look back on my career.

The time has come now to embark on a new adventure in podcasting.

Back in late 2010 a new podcast was started called Build & Analyze with Marco Arment and Dan Benjamin. I hadn’t really heard of either of them before but I immediately latched onto it. Marco’s experiences and perspectives in being a developer were both relevant to my work and engaging to hear. For the entire run of Build & Analyze you’d always find me in the chatroom listening live, suggesting titles.

In many ways it was the show that most motivated me to start podcasting. To create a venue for sharing my experiences and hard learned lessons. I was very sad when it finally wrapped up its 108 episode run. All that makes the prospect of starting a new development podcast with Marco a great joy.

If you liked listening to Developing Perspective I’d really encourage you to subscribe to Under the Radar. It is in many ways the spiritual successor to Developing Perspective and Build & Analyze. A venue for us both to discuss and examine what being a developer means today — the challenges we face, the opportunities we see, the lessons we learn. Oh, and it’s never longer than 30 minutes.

So let’s get Started

I tend to think of my app business in terms of revenue per day. Breaking it down to that level helps me keep a close eye on it and know how well or poorly I’m doing. Today I walk through the reasoning for this as well as do a thought experiment of what the numbers might look like for a new business.

Some thoughts on the implications of having to take an unplanned absence from your work when you are self-employed. There are a lot of benefits of being independent that manifest themselves in a situation like this but also a few things to be careful of and plan for.

An overview of what to expect this summer:


the beta schedule,
timing for release,
the importance of RADARS,
my growing interest in Swift and
an encouragement for everyone to build something new this summer.
Will Hains’ iOS Beta History

First Impressions from WWDC 2015. These are my initial reactions right after the Keynote, I’ll probably do another episode later in the week which has more considered reactions.

Some high level thoughts about WWDC and my excitement for it. Then, a few thoughts about whether mobile advertising is in a precarious position.