The early days
I'm Arthur, I'm 21 and I build cool stuff :)
I started programming as a teenager, alone in my room, just because I liked learning how things worked. At some point I realized people would pay me to build stuff, so I started freelancing. The day I turned 18, I registered my first business with my best friend from uni, Jérémie. We ran a small agency building SaaS and mobile apps for clients. It paid well. The business grew, we had a small local office and three friends working with us.
But we were building other people's products, and after a while that felt empty.
The startup detour
So we pivoted. At the agency, we'd built a proprietary embedding model specialized for French medical language. We sold it as innovation, got government funding for it. Then we partnered with two doctors and reused that same technology to launch an AI healthcare startup. I went through the whole ecosystem. Funds, incubators, business angels. I hated most of it. A lot of theory, not enough building. A lot of meetings about meetings.
Then my cofounder, Jérémie, left for personal reasons. He was the guy I started with, in the agency and in the medical company. Out of loyalty, I left too.
How did I get into mobile apps?
That's when everything changed. I decided I was done with the startup theater. No more pitch decks, no more incubators. I wanted to generate actual revenue. Every day. So I went all in on mobile apps. I'd worked on one during the medical startup and loved building it. AI was blowing up at the same time, so the timing made sense.
I launched my YouTube channel, Arthur Builds Stuff, to document what I was learning. Got 20,000 subscribers in three videos, which told me people cared about this stuff. I built a small portfolio of apps that hit $12K MRR at its peak. Launched an ASO tool to help other builders grow their apps ($5K MRR). Started a private community of mobile app builders that I genuinely love running.
Why did I start Tap & Swipe?
But the thing I kept noticing was this: every time I met another app builder, the conversation was always better than any content I could make alone. The stories were wild. People building $20K/month apps on the side of their day job. People who failed five times before something worked. People who made zero money but had 50,000 users who loved their product.
There was this show I watched a lot, Starter Story by Pat Walls. I liked it, but it was always about the money. How much MRR, how fast, what's the playbook. And sometimes the most interesting part is the story behind the numbers. Why someone built what they built. The job they were trying to escape. The pivot that almost killed them. The thing they learned that changed how they think about building.
Pat never invited me on his show, so I started my own. (just kidding Pat)
That's Tap & Swipe. Mobile app builders sharing the real story behind their apps. The idea, the code, the growth, the money, and everything that went wrong in between.
If you build apps, or want to, you're in the right place.