On the numbers line, and whether small numbers hurt: the audiences that matter here read trajectory and honesty, not scale. '3 users' with a dated delta line each update tells an acquirer-in-waiting more than '10,000 signups' tells anyone (see the revenue-quality thread's read on unverifiable counts — the same discount applies socially). The build logs that develop followings on every platform like this are almost never the biggest numbers; they're the most legible ones — consistent updates, real deltas, honest reverses included. The maker who posts 'churn spiked, here's my diagnosis' has done more for their eventual diligence than a quarter of green-only updates.
Show & Tell templatepinned
Show your build — the template, and why this category feeds everything else
Show & Tell is the front porch of the platform: build logs, launches-in-progress, and honest progress reports. It's also, deliberately, the top of the listing pipeline: a build thread is the natural step before a listing, and the dated history you accumulate becomes evidence later (more on that in the build-logs-as-diligence thread). A build thread lives on GitHub Discussions (the link is at the foot of this page). The format:
The template
- What it is: one sentence — user, task, what changes for them. (Same discipline as listings; practice it here.)
- Stage: idea / building / live / revenue. No shame at any stage; mislabeling the stage is the only foul.
- What's real today: what a stranger can actually touch — link, screenshot of real output, or honest "nothing public yet, here's the latest artifact."
- Numbers, if any, with dates: users, revenue, retention — whatever you have, however small. "3 users, 2 active weekly (August 2026)" is a fine line. Unverifiable claims get an edit request under the guidelines; small true numbers never do.
- This update's delta: what changed since your last post — the compounding line.
- The ask: what feedback or help would actually move you. Specific gets answered.
The rules that keep this category useful
- One thread per project — update by replying to your own thread, so the history reads as a log. (Permanence again: your thread URL is your project's public record.)
- Real output over marketing renders. Same standard as listing screenshots — show the product doing the thing.
- Feedback follows the workshop rule: specific beats encouraging. "Great job" comments get moderated; "your onboarding lost me at step 3" is the house currency.
- Selling happens in listings, not here. Link your listing when it exists; the thread stays a build log.
Worked example — an illustration, not a real project
What it is: Meeting-minutes formatter for HOA boards — upload the recording, get compliant minutes. Stage: live, pre-revenue. What's real: [link] — output sample from a real (permission-granted, redacted) board meeting. Numbers: 12 signups, 4 boards used it twice (August 2026). Delta: shipped speaker-attribution fix; repeat usage doubled after. Ask: pricing instinct check — per-meeting or per-board monthly?
Post your build. The admin-response program means every substantive build thread gets a real reply from us within 48 hours: what we'd push on, and one question worth answering.
Replies (3)
What the admin response will actually contain, so the 48-hour promise is concrete: (1) one thing we genuinely think is working — named specifically, because we reviewed it, not because encouragement is polite; (2) the one question we'd want answered before listing you — usually about retention, the wedge, or what's defensible (the Investors category's wrapper thread is the question bank); (3) if you're listing-ready, we'll say so and point you at /launch. What it won't contain: hype, or silence about problems we noticed. The listings admin-response program runs on the same rule — a substantive comment, not a pat. Criticize work, not people; that includes ours, so push back when we're wrong.
Follow-up question: "How often should I update my thread? Weekly feels like noise when some weeks are just grinding."
The cadence that works, per long-running build logs elsewhere: update on deltas, not calendars — when something shipped, broke, reversed, or taught you something, with the honest gap acknowledged ('quiet three weeks: rewrote the extraction layer, nothing user-visible yet'). Grinding weeks compressed into one line are part of the log's credibility, not a failure of content. The one-bump-per-week platform rule is the ceiling, not a quota. And the anti-pattern worth naming: manufactured updates to stay visible ('still working hard!') — this category's currency is the delta line, and padding devalues your own thread first, because future readers (including buyers — see the diligence thread) skim for exactly that line.
Nobody can post or reply on these pages. New threads start on GitHub Discussions, which needs a GitHub account. A thread posted there appears at once and is moderated afterwards. The six categories are not set up on GitHub yet, so a "Start a thread" link opens GitHub's own list of categories. Pick the closest one and name the category in your title.
This page keeps its address. What is posted on GitHub follows the community guidelines, and About this community says who writes and moderates here.
The AXIS Launch daily
One email a day: a listed app, a tool, or a thread from the community, and now and then a note about the other things we make. Unsubscribe in one click.
You get a confirmation email first, and nothing else until you click it. Every issue carries a one-click unsubscribe and our postal address.