Positions we hold and defend: the App Store is not a lottery, all-in-one apps lose, most AI apps die in 90 days, and installs are the wrong number to report.
The AI app graveyard is full of products that were demos, not habits. What separates the apps that are still growing a year later: a ritual, a personal detail, and a reason to come back without a notification.
Every app eventually faces the temptation to add the adjacent feature. Stories plus lullabies plus a sleep tracker plus a parenting forum. Why we say no, what it costs us, and the one condition under which we add.
"We miss you" is a notification that admits the app has nothing to say. The rule we use for every push: it must carry something the person did not have before. Examples that pass, and the ones that get an app muted.
Some features are off the table in Dreamify no matter what they would earn: ads, links out, chat, photos of the child, manipulative paywalls. The list, the reasoning, and why a short list of refusals is a product strategy.
The most common thing developers say about app success is that it is luck. It is a comforting story and a harmful one. What is actually within reach: the store page, the first session, the channel, the second week. And what luck still touches.
