35 Facet Tasks From the Buffer Group

We’ve all the time had teammates who’ve facet tasks along with working at Buffer. Engaged on new tasks, constructing, experimenting, and self-improvement are constructed into our DNA as an organization. So it is fairly widespread to be talking with somebody solely to seek out out they personal a small enterprise exterior of Buffer that began as a facet challenge. We even have a number of revealed authors and plenty of apps constructed by Buffer teammates.

We imagine this entrepreneurial spirit and artistic drive not solely enhances our particular person development but in addition enriches our tradition at Buffer. These passionate pursuits exterior of labor carry contemporary views, modern considering, and various talent units again to our group.

Within the spirit of celebrating these endeavors, we have compiled the blogs, companies, books, and apps created by Buffer teammates. We hope they encourage you as a lot as they encourage us.

The 35 facet tasks the Buffer group is engaged on

Right here’s what our group works on exterior of labor. Hopefully you would possibly spot some cool facet challenge concepts for your self, or take a look at a few of the issues our group works on.

Apps

Andy: Alpenglow, F1 Calendar, Starglow

• Alpenglow: An app to examine dawn, sundown and golden hour instances in addition to high quality predictions. Additionally sends out notification reminders and with Alpenglow Professional will notify you if the following forecast is wanting good in comparison with your required threshold. The app will be doing on each iOS and Android, typically featured by Apple and contains over 35+ localizations.
• F1 Calendar: Taking on the event from a couple of pals, I rebuilt F1 Calendar as a simple solution to examine Components 1 Session instances in your timezone in addition to making the information accessible by way of Calendar subscriptions. The location has been going for 14 years and we now have further websites for F1 Academy, F2, F3, Components E, IndyCar, MotoGP.
• Starglow: Primarily Alpenglow however for viewing the night time sky. It’s been requested fairly a bit from customers and pals. It shows climate parameters for every hour, centered totally on cloud protection and visibility that are key to view the night time sky clearly. The app is at present on the App Retailer for pre order, aiming to launch it in April.

David: Include
Include is a browser-based, accessibility-first design software. Present UI design instruments like Figma and Sketch are nice for visible explorations however grow to be cumbersome with responsive design, parts, animations, and person interactions. Web site builder instruments push an excessive amount of complexity on customers, and generate bloated, inaccessible code. Include solves this by residing within the browser, which means the whole lot you design is constructed with accessible HTML and CSS. This brings the design course of into the ultimate medium, making responsive design, container queries, and person interactions attainable whereas reducing a lot of the waste from the design course of.

Eric: PlayCraft
Platform for everybody to create internet video games and share it to their pals in seconds! We’ve constructed our personal modular framework to create video games actually rapidly for PixelBrawlGames. With right this moment’s AI capabilities, we’re utilizing this similar framework to create new video games with a single immediate.

Martin: Palabreja, Voices.ink

• Palabreja: A NYTimes Spelling Bee Sport clone in Spanish.
• Voices.ink: Voices.ink is a cutting-edge software that streamlines the note-taking course of by utilizing AI to document, transcribe, and analyse audio, summarizing it on to your Notion account. It identifies key factors and actionable objects, making certain detailed but concise notes.

Mike: Carpeta
Carpeta is a project-management software for inside designers, architects, and industrial designers to assist them centralize all their conversations, budgets, and information, and higher handle their time whereas managing their tasks.

Freelance

Karinna: Pilates Teacher
Karinna is a licensed Pilates & Lagree Teacher, and teaches lessons in her spare time.

Martin: Two Feelings
Avenue & Journey Images

Mitra: Social media supervisor for The Used, Thrice, Dustin Kensrue, and robbietheused
Mitra is the social media supervisor for bands/artists The Used, Story of the 12 months, Thrice, Dustin Kensrue, and robbietheused. She’s been working with these bands since 2017.

Mitra: Mitra Mehvar Images
Mitra does stay music images, primarily for rock bands.

Music

Brandon: Child Lightbulbs
Brandon writes, produces & releases music underneath the identify Child Lightbulbs from his small dwelling studio. He’s launched 3 albums underneath this identify, the newest being RUINED CASTLE in December 2024.

Nonprofits

Amanda: SheSharp
Amanda runs SheSharp: a non-profit basis primarily based in The Netherlands that makes it simpler for all ladies and non-binary individuals to enter, keep, and develop within the tech business. We host occasions, facilitate mentorship programmes and provides out funding via scholarships, and a plethora of different initiatives.

Kateryna: TallinnJS
It’s a technical group for JavaScript builders in Tallinn

Sofia: Nosotras Hablamos Design
Nosotras Hablamos Design is a group the place Spanish-speaking ladies come collectively to apply English and discover the world of design via partaking conversations and workshops.

Small Companies

Andy: Woof Warehouse
Andy works on a Shopify retailer that sells canine bandanas and equipment. He focuses totally on the tech facet of issues, customizing the shop, plugins, and branding, whereas additionally caring for and photographing the lovely pups.

Mike S: Otter, WTC

• Otter: Mike co-founded Otter. Based mostly in Spain, Otter helps individuals make customized furnishings by connecting them to native carpenter’s that go well with their wants.
• WTC: A hat model 🧢 with statements designed for creatives, entrepreneurs, and those that embrace a lifetime of considering and doing enterprise with objective – extra designs coming quickly!

Mitra: The Torshi Dough
Mitra bakes sourdough bread at her dwelling cottage bakery

Nathan: Riftgate
Nathan runs a brick-and-mortar retailer at 5412 S 900 E Murray, UT 84107.

Podcasts & Writing

Andy: Private weblog
Andy retains a private weblog the place he is written about App Clips in Alpenglow and plans to share extra clear updates about Alpenglow sooner or later.

Diego: Pink and Her Forged
Diego and his companion launched this ebook, which his companion wrote and illustrated himself. Diego did the enhancing, formatting, and canopy design (+ translation for the reason that ebook additionally exists in Spanish). They wished to create a ebook with a invaluable lesson for youngsters: That typically life will throw curve-balls our method, and that regardless that we would really feel like we’re the one ones going via it, we aren’t alone, and others would possibly truly be feeling the identical method or going via related conditions. Enjoyable truth: Their 8-year-old nephew did the Title and seems within the credit.

Hailley: Private weblog & weekly e-newsletter
Hailley writes a weekly e-newsletter in regards to the programs she makes use of in work and life; she additionally writes items for her private weblog, the place she shares extra in-depth appears at these programs and her profession development recommendation.

Jess: Pinecone Papers
A weblog about the best way to mindfully journal and monitor signs when you will have a continual sickness. Engaged on a downloadable printable journal that will probably be out later this yr.

Joe: Sensible Jetpack Compose, CI/CD for Android with GitHub Actions, Sensible KMP

• Sensible Jetpack Compose: A ebook to show Android Builders the best way to construct apps utilizing Jetpack Compose, Googles new UI framework for Android!
• CI/CD for Android with GitHub Actions: A ebook to show Android builders the best way to automate their testing and launch course of utilizing GitHub Actions.
• Sensible KMP: A ebook to to show builders the best way to construct apps utilizing Kotlin Multiplatform, the framework from Jetbrains that enables for code sharing between Android & iOS!

Joel: E-newsletter
Occasionally, Joel sends out a e-newsletter with hyperlinks he is saved, what he highlights in books, new and noteworthy at Buffer, one thing that is been on his thoughts, and a basic replace.

Kirsti: SA Tech Entrepreneurs Podcast and Neighborhood
The South Africa Tech Marketer’s podcast goals to assist highlight improbable expertise we’ve in South Africa, and the group is about as much as assist us join and develop. It’s sponsored by an organization referred to as The World Expertise Co, which is successfully a recruitment company for SA advertising and marketing expertise. They assist South Africans get distant jobs — it’s neat. 😄

Lexi: The Burden of Pleasure
Lexi’s debut novel is out there from Rejection Letters, an indie press.

Mike: Constructing Higher
A weekly podcast the place we replicate on constructing higher companies and relationships contained in the hectic startup and digital enterprise world.

Nate: Virtually Heretical
A podcast by Nate (a former pastor) and his spouse Shelby (a Bible scholar). They reimagine and revisit the Bible for these deconstructing Christianity.

Tami: Content material-as-a-Profession
Content material-as-a-Profession is a e-newsletter that shares tips about the best way to develop a private model that may safe world alternatives, together with a jobs board to related Advertising and marketing and Artistic roles. Shared on Fridays.

YouTube Channel

David: Construct UX
Construct UX is a YouTube channel on centered on accessible design and improvement. Previous sequence have centered on constructing out design concepts from Dribble in Figma and code to be accessible, performant, and responsive. Present movies give attention to shorter accessibility tutorials that span design and improvement, in addition to test-driven improvement (TDD) strategies used to construct resilient person interfaces.

Honorable point out: facet tasks that turned full-time

You may be questioning if these facet tasks ever flip into full-time companies – they do! We have had a number of teammates begin a facet challenge at Buffer solely to depart to pursue it full-time. When this occurs, we’re past excited for that individual. It is immensely gratifying to look at somebody construct one thing and see it succeed.

So, listed below are former Buffer teammates who left to pursue their facet tasks turned companies, give them a comply with or some help!

Over to You

We’d love to listen to from you! Are you engaged on any facet tasks? Be happy to drop a hyperlink within the feedback! In case you are, how do you find time for them and keep motivated, are you engaged on a couple of?