📌 Key Overview

I learned that proximity to a problem can blind you to the market reality. Between 2022 and 2025, I founded dither_, an arts platform connecting outsider audiences with local contemporary art in Australia. We hit 10,026 combined social followers, partnered with major art fairs, and got nominated for Best Arts Program in Sydney—but failed to build a sustainable business. Here's what went wrong, what worked, and how I think about product now.

"There’s a difference between what people say they want, actually need, and are willing to pay for."

<aside> 🧭

Navigation: Use table of contents in sidebar to jump between sections.

</aside>

<aside> 📊

STARTUP SNAPSHOT

Product: Exhibition discovery app + review platform for contemporary art audiences

Market: Art-curious, digitally native, culture vultures (18-35) in Sydney and Melbourne.

Timeline: December 2022 - December 2024 (24 months)

Team: 2 partners (Product, Engineering) part-time (Designer) freelance (Developers + Videographers)

Funding: Bootstrapped, fundraising & Creative Australia grant

Peak Traction: 144,000 event page views, 10026 subscribed audience, 1986 app downloads,

Why it closed: No path to revenue. Painfully slow growth. Founder burnout.

</aside>

✨ What Worked

✅ Partnership-led distribution unlocked reach

Results:

• Sydney Contemporary reel: 90,000 views
• Melbourne Art Fair: 250 followers/week (2x baseline growth)
• Incognito Art Show reel: 470,000 views
• Gained credibility and distribution impossible to build alone

Brutal truth: minimal conversion to app downloads despite social traction

✅ Social-first content drove more outcomes than the app

Value proposition = "What's On"→ Instagram Stories on the platform audiences already use. Tagged artists and galleries in every post—giving them shareable promotional material from a recognized platform. Zero friction.