On taking the long way

In the first of these notes I wrote that a studio that answers to itself can take the long way, and that it can ship an app when the app is ready. That note asked to be held against us later, so here is an account of how that line has been kept.

Thresho, the house's first app, which lives at getthresho.com and is still in TestFlight, has had its release moved past the summer it was first planned for.

The decision was made in early July, before that note was published, and it was mine to make. No one outside the house had set the summer date. We had, and so we could move it.

That note, published about two weeks later, still described the app as nearing its release. The date had already moved.

Moving it buys time for polish, guided by a summer of measured use from testers rather than anecdote, and time to prepare a release that gives the app a fair start.

Taking the long way is easy to write down and harder to do. A release date is a kind of proof that something is real, and moving one means a few more months in which the work is visible mostly to the people testing it. That trade was worth making. The house would rather keep its standard than its schedule.

This note is the record of that choice, kept where the first one asked to be checked. When the release comes, it will be noted here.