Directory's Finances
May 14, 2026
I’m not sure where to put finances on the website yet, but in the spirit of maintaining transparency, I thought I’d share some of the costs with y’all as another “ride-along”. Directory currently has no funding and was made for free and paid for out-of-pocket by your local unemployed friend (me).
I used to think that microservice bloat was endemic to nonsensical corporate environments, but as I work toward making Directory a reality, I have found that a fair amount of services are necessary. My short former life as a devops person has at least given me a sense of how to pick services that are cheap and have a minimal amount of BS.
That deserves a separate post, but suffice it to say I’ve tried my best to keep external services down to the bare essentials. Here are all of the subscription purchases I’ve made so far:
| Service | Product | Monthly Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Website, Server and Database Hosting | Render | ~$13 |
| Object Storage (photos) | Wasabi | $7 |
| Domain name | $1.67 | |
| Email Service | Fastmail | $5 |
| Email Newletter service | Buttondown | $9 |
| Business Phone Number | Hushed | $5 |
| Email automation service | Resend | $0 |
| Code Hosting | Github | $0 |
| Total | $40.67 |
| Service | Monthly Cost |
|---|---|
| Apple Developer Account | $8.25 ($99 yearly, absolutely bonkers) |
| Total with Apple | $48.92 |
The total recurring cost of keeping Directory running is less than most people’s home internet bill! And I don’t expect those numbers to go up by much until there are over 10,000 users.
There were also some one-time costs:
| Product | Price |
|---|---|
| Mac Book Neo | $600 |
| Google Developer Account | $25 |
| LLC registration | $225 (It’s actually $125 but I got it rushed due to poor planning) |
| Total | $850 |
I didn’t have any Apple products before starting work on Directory, but an
Apple computer and developer account is necessary to release anything on iOS
and all my friends’ macbooks are too bloated from planned obsolescence to help
me, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
Legal Costs
I did most of my legal research consulting and drafting with Claude. Then I was able to get a free 30 minute legal consultation at the Carolina Junction that assuaged my fears of using my own legal documents.
If I had used legal services from some of the lawyers I asked, normal rates were around $450/hour. One lawyer I contacted charges $350 just for an initial consultation!
Marketing Costs aaaaah
Since I’m in the Triangle, I will of course be using the Poster Guys ($100 for 200 posters around Chapel Hill and Durham). If any readers out there have other ideas for spreading the word locally, do let me know!
I’m also providing $50 per photo submission I use.
The Future
I initially decided to give myself a budget of about $2500 to see if I can get Directory off the ground to the point of being able to run on donations. I’m still within that budget.
If things get more serious I may need to give a lawyer some actual money for actual legal advice. And I may need to buy a dedicated IPhone for testing instead of borrowing my mom’s, but for now, things are pretty cheap.
The real cost of Directory has been my time. I’ve spent the last 12 weeks working more or less full time on this project. Perhaps once the technical part is done, Directory can stand on its own with simple maintanence and moderation.
Anything more is wishful thinking at this point, but we’ll see how well we do once we launch on mobile platforms later this month!
Stay tuned
~ Cecilia