How do I get startups to use my open-code project?
The goal is to automate the easy tickets that every decent engineer will solve in roughly the same way, and let us just accept a ready PR.
Now I'm stuck on a different problem: how do you get the first real startups to actually try an open source tool like this?
I have posted about my tool in X, reddit, and here. I have received stars and even some positive comments so it does seem like there is some interest in the idea, but AFAIK there isn't a startup that actually uses it.
I'm really not sure how to go about it, I'm not trying to make money from it, so I don't want to start cold approaching companies - but I like building stuff in my spare time and would have loved to see it really being used by startups.
How do I do that?
Repo if anyone is curious: https://github.com/ErezShahaf/Anabranch
Difficult just to get feedback. This seems like a cool project, I dont have a ticketing system otherwise i'd try it.
I am looking into this for my team
The idea of my project is that it is all done asynchronously, is that what you mean? You want it to happen outside of your personal computer?
Typical LLM-isms:
- "find this. do that." phrasing
- "the exact X"
- send a one liner
- "that's your shortest X to a Y"
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Here's what Claude had to say about it:
Yes, it does have some telltale signs. Here's why:
*Structural giveaways:*
- The "here's the insight → here's the action → here's the payoff" format is very common in LLM outputs — it's almost algorithmically tidy.
- The em dash used as a dramatic pause ("automates your easy Jira tickets into PRs automatically — want to try it?") is a pattern LLMs lean on heavily.
- "That's your shortest path to a real user" feels like a summarizing closer that an LLM adds to signal it's wrapping up with a punchline.
*Word/phrase patterns:*
- "exact stack" — this phrasing is very popular in AI-generated startup/GTM advice
- The overall register (confident, tactical, slightly bro-ish but polished) is a very common output of prompts like "give me a GTM strategy"
*What makes it not obviously AI:*
- It's specific enough (Jira + Claude/Cursor, YC, CTO on X) that it doesn't feel like generic filler
- The one-liner pitch itself is actually pretty natural
*The bottom line:* It reads like someone prompted an LLM for "what's the fastest way to find my first user" and lightly edited the output — or didn't edit it at all. The advice isn't bad, but the packaging has that characteristic "polished tactical bullet" energy that's hard to fake as organic thinking.
If you wrote it yourself, the main culprit is probably the closing sentence — humans tend to just stop rather than narrate their own conclusion.