Now, this is an interesting article reflecting on the use of software development similar to home cooking. The specific use in this case was to create a social media photo/video chat application for family members of the developer’s family to use. The motivation? They had an existing app Tapstack that they’ve used for quite a while, but Tapstack was not announcing updates or even asking long-term users to pay for the app, it was all zero-cost use without a means for donations.
Over the course of 2019, I felt a rising dread as the months ticked by and the app didn’t receive a single update. (That’s a new 21st-century feeling.) Sure enough, in the fall, Tapstack announced that it was shutting down. It offered its users a way to export their data. It went gracefully.
So, naturally, this family that really liked the app needed a replacement. They decided to go down their own app development path rather than using a different commercial app that would be plastered with ads, pushing updates and changes they may not like, and carrying the risk of shutting down.
20200215/https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/
Then the author goes on to reflect on all kinds of reasons for home-cooking, some of which are impractical in a wholistic sense but done for emotional reasons and the like.
But let’s substitute a different phrase: “learn to cook.” People don’t only learn to cook so they can become chefs. Some do! But far more people learn to cook so they can eat better, or more affordably, or in a specific way. Or because they want to carry on a tradition. Sometimes they learn just because they’re bored! Or even because—get this—they love spending time with the person who’s teaching them.
The list of reasons to “learn to cook” overflows, and only a handful have anything to do with the marketplace. This feels natural; anyone who has ever, like… eaten a meal… of any kind… recognizes that cooking is marbled deeply into domesticity and comfort, nerdiness and curiosity, health and love.
But, I must interject. Sure, it is common for home cooking to be done for “recreational” purposes where the participants laugh in the face of efficiency and practicality, but why do that? Why stop there when you can do better? You can network into larger groups that share the common interest and develop ways to work the solution more efficiently. Why stay unplugged and disconnected just for the heck of it?