As you likely already know, Qlearly was down for some time. We usually end up getting messages from people worried about the project being done, however, that is not the case nor is it what we are hoping for anytime soon!
This time around I was unable to access our admin section which made it hard to reach out to everyone. I also had to focus on my main project to keep up with the bills. Everything is back up and running now! You should be able to log in, logout, reset your password, visit our help center, etc.
If you are still encountering any issues, please email me: guillaume@qlearly.com
So what happened you may ask?
Unfortunately, Qlearly has been running at a loss for over three years now. Thus far, I have (Guillaume) spent close to $75,000 over three-plus years on this project. From paying a good friend of mine to help with some of the development, as well as keeping the servers up it has been quite an expensive venture with very low returns. So far, Qlearly has brought in around $10,000. This leaves me about $65,000 in the hole which is far from the proper way to run a business.
No, I am not a ‘trust fund’ kid or anything along those lines. The budget mentioned came from a 2nd project I have been working on for over 5 years. However, I don’t believe it is a wise decision to keep using revenue from other projects to keep Qlearly going so I am trying my best to keep Qlearly’s servers up with the revenue it is making on its own.
The reason the servers have been down for some time is for the above reason. Each month it is costing about $600+ to keep the servers up. After already spending some time optimizing that, it is down from $2,000+ a few months back. However, our revenue has been quite lower. This means on the top of already being $65,000 in the hole, I have to keep spending more just to keep everything working.
So what now?
15,000+ people and I seem to like Qlearly and want to keep using it. Even when our servers are down our weekly active users still increase. I really don’t want to take it down. I use it myself every day and rely on it quite a bit. Here is what will happen instead:
I have handled the server bills and we will be adjusting the pricing a bit. Our plan is to lower the pricing and focus on Yearly and Lifetime plans. Unfortunately, monthly plans are definitely not an option for this kind of project anymore. From what we have seen over the past three years, the interest in a monthly subscription has been extremely low which is quite understandable.
I am also trying everything I can to lower the server costs while keeping the platform working well and as fast as possible. If you happen to be familiar with this I would love to hear from you, my email is: guillaume@qlearly.com
What else can we expect?
As of now, here is a brief list of what I already fixed and will be fixing soon.
Fixed:
- Login system (manual and Google)
- Password reset system
- Shared board invitation
- Help center SSL (help.qlearly.com/v2)
Next (in no specific order):
- Updating the pricing
- Referral system (Get early access by filling out this form)
- Publishing the v1 of our mobile app
- Fixing lost bookmarks issue once and for all
- ‘Move To’ feature bug
Thank you for taking the time to read this. If you paid for a lifetime plan, I know this is ‘none of your business, etc.’ however there really is not much more that I can do at this point besides trying my best to keep Qlearly profitable from this point on.
We really hope the new pricing (TBA) will resonate with people!
Stay safe,
Guillaume Bardet
Twitter: https://twitter.com/guillaumebardet
Email: guillaume@qlearly.com
