The TFUT Methodology: Ship Value in 24 Hours

The 6-Month Lesson That Changed Everything

I spent 6 months building the “perfect” app. Beautiful code. Scalable architecture. MVP features that customers would want to pay for.

The problem: the ground has shifted in the software development world. With AI, you need to deliver value much faster. Spending time crafting the perfect app from the start won’t give you a competitive advantage.

That realization in lost opportunity taught me a very valuable lesson: Perfect products atrophy in development. Useful products evolve in the market.

That’s when I developed TFUT - The First Useful Thing.

What is TFUT?

TFUT is a development methodology with one core principle: Ship something useful within 24 hours, then iterate based on real user feedback.

Not something perfect. Not something scalable. Not something feature-complete.

Something useful.

The Traditional Way (That Kills Products)

• Month 1: Planning the perfect architecture
• Month 2: Building core features
• Month 3: Adding nice-to-haves
• Month 4: Polishing the UI
• Month 5: Beta testing
• Month 6: Launch
• Result: 90% failure rate

The TFUT Way (That Ships Products)

• Day 1: Ship one useful feature
• Day 2: Get user feedback
• Day 3: Improve based on feedback
• Day 7: Add payment if users want it
• Day 30: Profitable or pivot
• Result: You know if it works in weeks, not months

The Psychology Behind TFUT

Momentum > Perfection

Every day you don’t ship, you lose:

• Motivation (excitement fades)
• Market position (competitors ship)
• Learning (no user feedback)
• Revenue (can’t charge for vaporware)

Every day you DO ship, you gain:

• Energy (shipping creates momentum)
• Users (even if just one)
• Knowledge (real feedback > assumptions)
• Options (pivot, persist, or profit)

The Compound Effect of Daily Shipping*

• Day 1: 1 feature, 1 user
• Day 7: 7 improvements, 10 users
• Day 30: 30 iterations, 100 users
• Day 90: Product-market fit, 1,000 users
• Day 365: Category leader, 10,000 users

Small daily progress compounds into massive results.

*Your ability to find an audience will directly impact this metric.

The TFUT Framework

Step 1: Identify The First Useful Thing (4 hours)

Ask yourself:

• What’s the ONE feature that delivers value?
• What would make ONE person pay $1?
• What can I build in ONE day?

Example: Building a task management app?

• ❌ NOT: User authentication, team collaboration, AI prioritization
• ✅ YES: A simple list where you can add and check off tasks

Step 2: Build Only That (8 hours)

Rules:

• No scalability considerations
• No fancy architecture
• No edge cases
• No “we might need this”

Just build the useful thing.

Step 3: Ship to One Person (1 hour)

Find ONE person who needs this. Could be:

• You
• Your spouse
• A friend
• Someone from X
• A potential customer

Get them using it TODAY.

Step 4: Watch and Learn (2 hours)

• How do they use it?
• What confused them?
• What did they ask for?
• What did they ignore?

Step 5: Iterate Tomorrow (Repeat)

Based on what you learned:

• Fix the biggest frustration
• Add the most requested feature
• Remove what nobody used
• Ship again

The Clock Is Ticking

Here’s the truth: While you’re reading this, someone with half your experience is using AI to ship their third product this month. They’re not smarter than you. They just understand the new rules.

In 2025, AI hasn’t just changed how we build – it’s changed the physics of competition. Your competitor can now build in hours what used to take weeks. The only moat left isn’t your code quality. It’s your speed to market.

TFUT isn’t just a methodology anymore. It’s survival.

The beautiful part? Starting gets easier every day. AI tools get better. Deployment gets faster. Users expect iteration, not perfection. The universe is conspiring to help you ship.

But you won’t do it. You’ll bookmark this and go back to planning. Because shipping something imperfect today feels scarier than failing perfectly six months from now.

Prove me wrong.

Build the simplest useful thing you can imagine. Ship it before you go to bed tonight.

Because in this new reality, there are only two types of builders:

Those who ship.

And those who become case studies for why someone else won.

The clock is ticking. What’s your first useful thing?

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P.S. – The time you spent reading this? Someone just shipped. Better catch up.