One-person software lab · apps and websites
Small software, built on purpose.
n3rdlabs is King56Bob's studio brand. Under it, Zane builds apps that fix one annoying thing well, from Lodge, private video rooms for your closest friends, to a scoreboard so nobody does math on game night, and makes websites for people and businesses who need one.
Flagship · EXP-001
Lodge
The big one. A private place to hang out with your closest friends: not a feed and not a meeting app, but a room that's yours, with a couch, a door people knock on, and only the people you actually want there.
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A room that stays yours
Permanent Lodges with seats, themes and photos on the walls. They sleep when nobody's home and wake up when someone shows up.
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Knock to come in
Friends knock, you let them in. Your phone buzzes for knocks and calls, even with the app closed.
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Video that just works
Group video right in the browser. If your camera's busy or blocked, you still get in on audio.
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Music, memories, game nights
A shared YouTube or Spotify queue, a 3-2-1 group photo album, and Lodge nights everyone can answer in, maybe or out.
Index / 001 to 007
Experiments
Everything that made it out of the lab, plus a few things that haven't yet. Each one started because something annoyed me and I figured I could fix it.
- EXP-001 Lodge Private video rooms for your closest friends. No likes, no endless scroll, no audience: just a place to knock, join, and hang out.
- EXP-002 The Button One big red button, one global count, and way more going on than there should be: a leaderboard, achievements (one is for pressing at 3 AM), a daily shop, and random events.
- EXP-003 Scoreboard Math-free scoring for card and lawn games. Type in what's left in front of you at the end of a round and it works out the points. Dutch Blitz is live; mini golf is next.
- EXP-004 Brewbook A shared coffee recipe book for your home café. Save the brews that worked, share them with the people you make coffee for, and stop guessing at ratios every morning.
- EXP-005 NerdNav An iPhone app for tech pilgrimages. Visit iconic spots like the garage where Apple started, read the backstory, take a quick quiz, and earn XP as you go.
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EXP-006 UNSIGNED A capture-the-flag first-person shooter. Two teams, one flag each, no mercy. It isn't public yet, and that's about all there is to say for now.
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EXP-007 403 An Android app that fights procrastination with friction. When work time hits, the phone locks down to calls and texts until you tap an NFC tag, which starts a session where only your work apps open.
Services
I build websites, too.
Need a site for your business, team, club or idea? I design it, code it from scratch, get it online and keep it running, the same way I run my own projects.
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01
Designed for you
No templates or page builders. It looks like you, not like every other site out there.
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02
Fast on every screen
Built phone-first, quick on slow connections, and secure with HTTPS from day one.
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03
Your domain and email
I can set up your web address and a you@yourbusiness email, so everything looks professional.
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04
Hosting and changes
I can host it on my own server, keep it updated, and make changes whenever you need them.
Protocol
How the lab runs
Four rules every experiment has to pass before it leaves the bench.
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01
People first, internet second.
Everything here started as something for my friends, my family, or me. If it helps someone else too, even better.
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02
No ads, no trackers, no feeds.
Nothing here is built to farm your attention. The apps load fast, ask for as little as possible, and get out of the way.
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03
Self-hosted where it can be.
Most of these run on one Linux box I look after myself, so I know exactly where the data lives and who can touch it.
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04
Ship small, then fix it.
Experiments go live early and get better from real use. If something breaks, tell me and it gets fixed.
Contact
Want a website, found a bug, or have an idea?
zane@n3rdlabs.devGoes straight to me. I usually reply within 24 hours.