This post is largely about giving myself permission to stop—for a moment, at least. It comes in multiple parts, with varying levels of detail.

TL;DR

I’m planning to take a break from active indie software development—the field has changed beyond recognition and, try as I might (and boy have I tried), I no longer find joy in it.

Shipped apps will go into maintenance mode (for a while at least); work on Reconnect, plptools and other Psion projects will continue; as will some hardware projects. Most everything else will be indefinitely suspended.

If you’d like to understand a little more, read on.

Why?

AI is a big driver for this decision. With just a few exceptions, I choose not to use it. I have huge moral, ethical, environmental, and practical concerns and, even if it were a perfect technology, it doesn’t match the way I create—slow, considered iteration is, I believe, vital in designing good products. Unfortunately, the whole landscape is changing and it’s not possible to simply opt-out: it speeds the discovery of zero days, increases the frequency of supply chain attacks, hastens the pace of upstream releases, and creates a cacophonous landscape of carbon-copy clones. Ill-advised application is also making traditional supporting infrastructure like GitHub increasingly brittle. Keeping on top of this as an individual leaves little time to create or experiment, and brings huge challenges to finding an audience. And then there’s the cognitive load of watching the industry I love tear itself apart, which is simply devastating.

Of course, the culture around AI is just a symptom—it’s an impressive technology with many valid applications, but the rabid uptake is emblematic of a wider industry malaise: the broad direction of the software industry hasn’t spoken to me for at least a decade, with its focus on growth, ever-faster releases, user-engagement, dark patterns, and ultimately drug-pushing tactics.

What?

After months of pulling every possible lever I can think of (short of vibe coding), I’ve come up short and burned myself out in the process. I very clearly need to pause, reconsider, give the industry time to get over whatever—fingers crossed—momentary wobble it’s going through, and explore new things. I might use this an excuse to finally daily drive Linux. Most likely, I’ll step back and investigate other fields. My partner Sarah and I are also considering a move, which will doubtless take time.

As for my existing body of work, completely released programs like Anytime, Overview, and Thoughts will enter maintenance mode: I have put systems in place to keep these up to date and ensure they receive security fixes where appropriate. Programs that have never reached stable like Builds, Fileaway, and Folders will go away for the time being (sorry if you’re one of the handful of users). The various libraries and tools I maintain will continue unchanged—I rely on these to keep everything ticking over.

I plan to continue development of Reconnect and plptools: Psions have been a refuge for me in the changing world of technology, it’s where I’ve found the warmest community, and I recognise that’s true for many others too. I would like to continue to support that, and will do so as long as it remains sustainable and enjoyable. (Perhaps there’ll even be more room for growth as I’m doing fewer other things.) The Psion Software Index will also remain, as will OpoLua (Tomsci already does most of the feature development here).

For many who aren’t excitedly waiting for new apps and features, this should all look very much like business as usual; that’s certainly the goal. Things that work should just keep working and, if you have a bug or a feature request, I still encourage you to raise it—that’s how I know you’re using an app and that there’s work to be done.

My hardware projects have been one of the few shining lights of late and I intend to continue to take time for these. As they tend to be one-offs, they look far more sustainable. They’re also one of the ways I get to push back against Big Tech—I would, for example, love to see more people using the Little Luggable and cyberdecks in place of their mainstream siblings.

Details

For those of you seeking even more detail, here’s the per-project breakdown.

Apps

Tools

Libraries

Services

If I’ve left something of the list you’d like clarification on, or if you just want to say hi, please get in touch.

Thank You

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for taking the time to read and engage with what I do, now and over the years. I have no idea what the future will bring but I hope this gives me a chance to discover new and more sustainable ways to bring my creativity to the world.