Aquarc Shut Down
Aquarc is shutting down. Here's why and what I'm doing now.
I've learned a lot by working on Aquarc. I made a huge team, ended up getting rid of half the people, started with ECs and internships and then later pivoted to an SAT website. It took me a while to realize the importance of consolidating market share in one market before moving onto others and making an ambitious WeChat-like app for high schoolers, which was my dream. Recently, the Aquarc server stopped working and I've come to realize I either have to pay for a VPS or migrate to Vercel. So we're deciding to shut down.
I'm not shutting down because its "too hard." I know it will take a lot of code, a lot of validation, and I constantly will have to market. I'm shutting down because I learned what success meant in this field.
To "succeed" with Aquarc means to have high user count, high user retention, and to have constant bombardment of emails and messages about bugs or feature requests or cold emails about an HR AI-powered software. I've come to realize that I'm not interested in making it big or ending up on the news with the spotlight on me or even making huge sums of money without the human connection behind it.
In the months since I've entered my relationship, I've come to realize that my interests lie in providing a supportive environment for the people around me. That's why Varun Pannala and I are actively marketing & working on codeabode and building Agentic AI behind it to generate homework, curriculums, and make the learning as self paced as possible, so that our students know how to Google, StackOverflow, ChatGPT or whatever they need to do to reach their ambitions.
Ronith Neelam and I are going to work on porting Aquarc to Vercel which should be easy & solving the larger bugs so that the site can continue to be used by the people who are reliant on it. Sorry, all the accounts were wiped during the server failure.
I've made all the Aquarc materials-logo, brand assets, code, etc- public domain. You can view our code at https://lnkd.in/dUUTRwFy . Feel free to copy it, steal it, call a completely unrelated startup "Aquarc," or whatever. If you need help stealing it, working on it, or anything like that, I'd love to help you. If I decide to re-open Aquarc in the future, we'll still keep all those assets under public domain.
For those of you who will go on to form businesses and startups or look for ECs now, I have a few words of advice. Don't "look" for an idea, look for problems. Better yet, you'll notice them in the world already or by getting out into the real world. I found a need to build Agentic AI when I started having to teach more students. Feel free to use software like LinkedIn (I would not have met Ronith Neelam without this app) but get into the real world, commute to NYC (or whatever city is in your area or even the local village, whatever) work a job, talk to people, network, and dig into whatever you can. You don't need to start by making a "startup." You start by finding a problem in real life.
Edit 9/1/2025: This is the same reason why a social media app for dog lovers may look like a great idea on paper, but fall apart when it comes to getting users simply because the problem it solves is negligible. When I made StockSort, an AI-powered inventory management platform and tried to sell to the companies in downtown Princeton, it turns most businesses had no issues using paper and pencil or whatever corporate management platform they used.
I have mixed feelings about shutting it down. I know I will let down my friends who were working on core infrastructure and those who have worked on it for years, but the experience gained and the actual code aren't going anywhere. It won't take much for me to start working on it again, but that'll be when I want to and I know it is helpful, but if I don't keep my customer (even my friends) they can just go to another site. When I teach, I know I have an advantage because I focus so thoroughly on each student. And I love that about what I do.
As for this blog, I probably will not post that much moving forward. I do need to do more internal reflection (for my Common App Essays too!) but I don't see as much of a need to stay "online."
Drop me an email if you wanna talk.
Tags: reflection