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Code Story

E8: Jon Buda, Transistor.fm

Building on the early tech he learned, Jon Buda became a ruby on rails champion - building his projects using the back and front end components of the language. Having created a Spotify like music platform - way before Spotify existed - he gained large experience in what is required to host and process audio files. While working at Cards Against Humanity…

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  1. What Is Jon Buda's Podcast Platform Transistor.fm?

    at 2:50 · Transcript

    Jon Buda describes Transistor.fm as a podcast hosting and analytics platform. A show needs a place to store audio, an RSS feed with the show and episode details, listener numbers, and distribution to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and other apps. Transistor is the subscription product that does that. It can also build a website for the podcast and supply embeddable players if you want to keep your own site. Buda says the aim is to make publishing easy once the episode is recorded. He had helped build an earlier podcast platform that came apart for him around 2015, then stayed around shows while working at Cards Against Humanity in Chicago.

  2. Why Did Jon Buda Start Working on Transistor.fm

    at 3:51 · Transcript

    Interested in podcasting and working at Cards Against Humanity, Jon wanted to create a better experience for his coworkers, so he convinced them to sign up for his software before anything had even been built. Once he had the users, Jon built the tools.

  3. Why Did Jon Buda Partner With Justin Jackson on Transistor.fm

    at 6:51 · Transcript

    Initially Jon wanted to build the product completely on his own, but realizing he was a great coder but not a marketer, partnering with Justin would bring a lot of value to the table, and turn his side project into a real business.

  4. How Did Jon Buda Start Coding in Ruby on Rails

    at 8:35 · Transcript

    While in college, Jon created an open-source music player, which later got him a consulting gig, an untimely turned into his first startup experience. This was also his very first project in freshly released Ruby on Rails.

  5. How Do You Choose What Features to Put Into an MVP

    at 13:54 · Transcript

    When starting to build Transistor.fm, Jon already knew what he needed to create in order to host a podcast - an RSS feed, a website, and few other things. He sketched it on paper, generated a rails app, and dove right in, sketching directly in code as he went along.

  6. How Does Jon and Justin of Transistor Prioritize Their Roadmap

    at 15:54 · Transcript

    Customer feedback drives some of the feature priority, and some are driven by the industry and where it is going overall.

    However, they do not put too much attention on feedback because a small loud minority might be able to force a huge backlog of ideas that don't add a lot of value.

    Instead, they carefully sort through all the ideas, and evaluate how those fit into their overall road map. Then, the team spends about six weeks working on each large feature, building and refining it along the way.

  7. What Are Jon's Thoughts on Venture Funding and Hiring

    at 21:14 · Transcript

    Before quitting their others jobs to focus on Transistor full time, Jon and Justin considered taking on venture funding to grow, but ultimately decided against it.

    Now that the company is making good revenue, they would consider hiring a support person to offload some of the day-to-day stress, but ironically, hiring someone else would create stress of its own.

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