Hi,
Thank you for the feedback and raising the valid concerns.
You are right in saying there is a risk that the business could close down, but I think this a risk shared by most new bootstrapped businesses. Until you reach a good level or MRR, a stable product and a loyal customer base, there will always be that risk.
I can only say that I will give the business all my efforts, energy and make the best decisions to help it succeed. This project started off as a ‘scratch my own itch’ project and soon turned into a bootstrapped business after talking with friends in the industry.
It was clear they were experiencing the same frustrations as I was experiencing so I thought it was an ideal time and project to give it a shot and try to build a business out of it.
To address the concern about a customer having their links stop working if the business shuts down:
I don’t think a concern should exist as from day 1 there will be a ‘download stack’ option for offline/local use. If ScriptStack runs into problems and we had to shut down, I wouldn’t just turn everything off overnight. I would give some notice and a bit of lead time so each customer could make alternative arrangements.
You also touched on CDN services - ScriptStack works in a similar way to a cdn as it will be served directly to your project, however, ScriptStack allows you to customise certain scripts (like Google Analytics) and add them to your project with just one css and one javascript reference.
So for example, if we take bootstrap, jquery and google analytics as an example, instead of having to include many css and javascript references like below:
<!-- BOOTSTRAP -->
<!-- Latest compiled and minified CSS -->
<link rel="stylesheet" href="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.6/css/bootstrap.min.css" integrity="sha384-1q8mTJOASx8j1Au+a5WDVnPi2lkFfwwEAa8hDDdjZlpLegxhjVME1fgjWPGmkzs7" crossorigin="anonymous">
<!-- Optional theme -->
<link rel="stylesheet" href="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.6/css/bootstrap-theme.min.css" integrity="sha384-fLW2N01lMqjakBkx3l/M9EahuwpSfeNvV63J5ezn3uZzapT0u7EYsXMjQV+0En5r" crossorigin="anonymous">
<!-- Latest compiled and minified JavaScript -->
<script src="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.6/js/bootstrap.min.js" integrity="sha384-0mSbJDEHialfmuBBQP6A4Qrprq5OVfW37PRR3j5ELqxss1yVqOtnepnHVP9aJ7xS" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
<!-- JQUERY -->
<script src="https://code.jquery.com/jquery-3.0.0.min.js"></script>
<!-- GOOGLE ANALYTICS -->
<script type="text/javascript">
var _gaq = _gaq || [];
_gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-XXXXX-X']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);
(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
})();
</script>
You can just do this instead (which is much easier to include and convenient to remember without having to consult documentation)
<link href="https://scriptstack.io/myusername/prototypestack.css">
<script src="https://scriptstack.io/myusername/prototypestack.js"></script>
Another benefit is that you can add/remove scripts straight from our dashboard and not have to change lines of code in the project.
I don’t think this solution is for everyone and it doesn’t fit all use-cases, however, I do see value in it and I believe a good number of other people will do.
Thanks again for the feedback, I hope I have addressed most of the concerns you raised.
Michael
