Highlights

• Two of my blog posts reached the front page of Hacker News.
• I may have finally discovered a way to scale my keto site profitably.
• I’m putting Portfolio Rebalancer on the backburner due to lack of traction.

Goal grades

At the start of each month, I declare what I’d like to accomplish. Here’s how I did against those goals:

Conduct five customer interviews for the portfolio rebalancer

• Result: Conducted zero customer interviews.
• Grade: F

I deprioritized the portfolio rebalancer in favor of Is It Keto. I’ll explain why below.

Last week, I published a blog post describing how Stripe recorded visitor behavior on their customers’ websites. In short, Stripe’s JavaScript library collected information about URLs users visited and telemetry about their mouse movements, even when the site never displayed any Stripe payment forms. I suspected that most Stripe customers were unaware of this and argued that Stripe should disclose their data gathering practices more prominently and in greater detail.

The post generated a lively discussion on Hacker News, including several comments from Patrick Collison, Stripe’s co-founder and CEO. In his top comment, he said:

Among startups and tech companies, Stripe seems to be the near-universal favorite for payment processing. When I needed paid subscription functionality for my new web app, Stripe felt like the natural choice. After integration, however, I discovered that Stripe’s official JavaScript library records all browsing activity on my site and reports it back to Stripe. This data includes:

1. Every URL the user visits on my site, including pages that never display Stripe payment forms
2. Telemetry about how the user moves their mouse cursor while browsing my site
3. Unique identifiers that allow Stripe to correlate visitors to my site against other sites that accept payment via Stripe

This post shares what I found, who else it affects, and how you can limit Stripe’s data collection in your web applications.

Highlights

• My loved ones and I are safe and healthy.
• WanderJest is on hiatus due to the nationwide shutdown.
• I’m working on a product to help investors rebalance their portfolios.

COVID-19 and me

Obviously, the most relevant thing to happen in the last month has been the global spread of COVID-19. It has been a difficult and rapidly-changing time for all of us, and I hope that we can all return to normal life quickly when it’s safe to do so.

Highlights

• I’m betting big on a publicity campaign that’s at risk of failing spectacularly.
• WanderJest finally earned its first dollar of revenue, but in a way that is definitely unsustainable.
• Poor work habits have left me with the most stress I’ve felt in a year.

Goal grades

At the start of each month, I declare what I’d like to accomplish. Here’s how I did against those goals:

Make $1 in revenue

• Result: Earned $100 in revenue
• Grade: A

I’ve been pursuing affiliate partnerships for WanderJest, and I had agreements with three different shows to pay me a percentage of any purchases with WanderJest’s discount code. Crushingly, zero customers purchased tickets using my code.