Every piece of software has a story.
Some rise to stardom, touching millions of lives. Others fade away, leaving behind only a dusty GitHub repo and a few faint commits.

If you listen closely, you can almost hear their last wish:
“I was made with love. I only wanted to be used.”

The Age of Lovable, Quick Creations

Never before has it been so easy to bring an idea to life. Frameworks, no-code platforms, AI copilots, open-source libraries, building software today can feel like sketching on a napkin. A weekend hackathon can result in a polished, usable product that would have taken a team of engineers months just a decade ago.

This democratization of software creation is magical. It means the barrier to entry is nearly gone. Anyone can create something lovable, something personal, quirky, niche, and brilliant.

But what happens next?

The Graveyard of Forgotten Apps

For every viral success story, there are thousands of projects that die quietly. They’re not bad products. In fact, many of them are delightful. They just never found their way to the people who needed them.

Here’s the hard truth: making software is now the easy part. Selling it, sustaining it, and helping it thrive. That’s the hard part.

The internet is littered with tiny apps, abandoned SaaS experiments, and browser extensions that had everything but distribution. Their creators poured their hearts into the build but never found the energy, know-how, or courage to take on the messy work of marketing, pricing, or community building.

And so, the last wish of many dying pieces of software remains unfulfilled: “I only wanted to be loved by someone out there.”

The Hidden Cause: No Sales, Only Ads

In today’s SaaS / startup world, the easy path seems obvious: build something good, run some ads, maybe get lucky with virality. Google Ads, Facebook Ads, social media posts, many founders lean heavily on them, hoping traffic or click numbers will translate to real customers.

But here’s the quiet tragedy: ads + marketing don’t replace sales or strong distribution.

Some SaaS startups with “good product + good design” die quietly because they never had a coherent sales process. Because they never focused enough on outreach, relationship-building, demos, follow-ups. Because they assumed people would find them if they just launched.

Statistics back this:

• ~42% of startups fail because there is no meaningful market demand, people simply don’t need the product enough to pay for it.

• ~38% of SaaS products fail due to running out of cash, often because revenue never catches up to the cost of acquiring users, especially if there is no strong sales function.

• Many report “missing effective distribution channels” and “lack of consistent sales approach” among the top failure reasons.

If all you have is ads, you might get visits, sign-ups, maybe free trials, but without sales conversations, feedback loops, trust, stakeholder involvement, upsells, renewal, you often stall.

The Selling Challenge

So why is selling so hard?

• Noise. Every app store, Product Hunt page, and social feed is flooded with launches. Standing out is harder than ever.

• Makers vs. Sellers. Many software creators are engineers or hobbyists, not marketers or salespeople. They love building but dread pitching.

• The Illusion of “If you build it, they will come.” This mantra still haunts the indie software world. Building something lovable isn’t enough. People have to find it, trust it, and decide to use it.

• The Economics. Pricing models are treacherous. Too cheap, and sustainability crumbles. Too expensive, and adoption never takes off.

The result? Brilliant software withers away before it ever gets a chance to shine.

A Hopeful Shift

But not all is lost.

A new wave of creators is beginning to embrace the idea that shipping is only half the story. Communities around indie hacking, open-source sponsorship, and “build in public” movements are helping makers not just build, but also sell and sustain.

Some are learning to tell their software’s story, to speak in human terms about why it matters. Others are finding joy in the marketing process itself, treating it as another form of creation, not a chore.

And slowly, the graveyard of forgotten apps may start to shrink.

Conclusion: A Software’s Last Wish

When you strip away the code and features, every piece of software has one desire: to be used, to be useful, to be loved.

The last wish of a dying software is not to have been perfect, but to have touched someone’s life before fading away.

If you’re a builder, remember this: the act of creation is only half the journey. The rest, the scary, messy, vulnerable part of selling is not just about survival. It’s about giving your software the chance to fulfill its wish.

So don’t let your next project die quietly.
Help it find the people who will love it.

Written by
Eric Akiba - Co-Founder at QuickPipe.Ai