gtm: launch-readiness funnel repair + demo video + spike launches (path to 1000 stars)

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Goal

Get agentwire from 17 stars to 1000. A council review (2026-06-07) converged on a clear verdict: this is not a content-calendar problem — it's a funnel repair + friction collapse + launch spikes problem. The repo's own history proves it: the automated X content pipeline (Feb 13–26, 2026; 16 posts, hashtags, generated images) produced zero stars, while two failed Show HN posts (Feb 10–11, 1 point each) still drove 3 of the first 4 stars. Comparable tools in this exact niche (slopus/happy 21.7k stars/11mo, claude-squad 7.7k/15mo, vibetunnel 4.5k/12mo, omnara 2.6k/11mo) all got their first 1000 from spike events — HN front page, viral 30s demo clips, r/ClaudeAI posts — never from drip-posting on an audience-less account.

Current trajectory: ~3 stars/month → 1000 in ~27 years. The fix is sequenced below.

Scope

In:

• Funnel repair: broken proof assets, security default, unified positioning ✅ (shipped)
• 3–5 instrumented launch spikes (Show HN relaunch, X demo thread, r/ClaudeAI)
• Weekly star-count review so nothing dies silently again

Out:

• The 20–30s demo video — dropped 2026-06-07 (owner decision: not doing this at this time). Launch spikes will run on written/screenshot proof instead; if a spike underconverts specifically for lack of motion proof, revisit.
• Friction collapse — broken out to friction collapse: degraded-but-instant first-run mode (<60s to first voice command) #251 (degraded-but-instant first-run mode + five-stranger install test). Phase 3 spikes are gated on it.
• Resurrecting the broadcast-only X drip pipeline (free-tier API = post-only, no engagement; it produced 0 stars and silently died Feb 26 — stays off until engagement capability exists)
• Multi-month content calendar / copy campaign as the primary strategy
• AI-generated promo posted to HN/Reddit/lobste.rs (those communities detect and punish it; solo-dev authenticity is the product)

Approach

Phase 0 — Funnel repair ✅ (shipped via #246 / #248 — see comments)

• README demo.gif 404 removed, Discord badge fixed, honest ~15-min setup copy
• Portal default-binds 127.0.0.1; origin checks + token auth for non-loopback (feat(portal): security hardening — origin checks + token auth (close the no-auth gap behind the bind default) #247/feat(portal): security hardening — origin checks + token auth (#247) #248)
• One-liner unified across GitHub description / README / website hero

Phase 1 — Launch spikes (instrumented; gated on #251)

3–5 spike events, in rough order:

1. Show HN relaunch — 4 months and a substantially evolved product justify a repost; first-person comments throughout the thread.
2. X thread — human-authored, screenshots/terminal recordings as the payload.
3. r/ClaudeAI post — comparables earned 50–200 stars per post here.
4. Newsletter/aggregator pitches as available.

Instrument the funnel per spike: impressions → repo visits (GitHub traffic API; baseline is 21 uniques/fortnight) → installs → first external issue filed → stars. If a well-executed spike converts near zero, the remaining work is product-shaped, not content-shaped — that's the falsification test, and it's cheap.

There is also a clock: if Anthropic ships native voice in Claude Code or its mobile app, the wedge narrows overnight. Spike attempts soon beat a slow content program.

Phase 2 — Keep it alive

Weekly star-count + funnel review tied to a visible metric, so no pipeline silently dies the way February's did (its last cron log entry: "Task x-post-niche: incomplete", unnoticed for 3.5 months). Drip content is connective tissue at most, and only after X engagement capability exists.

Phases

• Phase 0 — Funnel repair: demo.gif 404, Discord badge, 127.0.0.1 default bind + trust model, unified one-liner, honest setup copy (fix(gtm): Phase 0 funnel repair — broken assets, portal bind default, unified positioning #246, feat(portal): security hardening — origin checks + token auth (#247) #248)
• Phase 1 — Show HN relaunch; X thread; r/ClaudeAI post; funnel instrumented per spike (gated on friction collapse: degraded-but-instant first-run mode (<60s to first voice command) #251)
• Phase 2 — Weekly star/funnel review standing; drip stays off until engagement capability exists

Verification

• Phase 0: ✅ verified in comments — no demo.gif references remain; fresh load_config() defaults to 127.0.0.1 (unit-tested); one-liner verbatim on repo description, README line 1, site hero.
• Phase 1 (Critic's instrumented-funnel metrics): per spike, record impressions → GitHub uniques (traffic API, vs. 21/fortnight baseline) → PyPI installs (discounting mirror-bot noise) → external issues filed → stars gained in 48h. Success bar from comparables: a landed Show HN yields 200–800 stars in 48h; near-zero conversion on a well-executed spike triggers the pivot to product work.
• Phase 2 (Historian's weekly review): a recurring weekly check (scheduler task or calendar) logs star count + funnel deltas; two consecutive missed reviews = the process is dead and must be declared so, not left silent.

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Phase 0 shipped — funnel repair across both repos:

• agentwire-dev fix(gtm): Phase 0 funnel repair — broken assets, portal bind default, unified positioning #246 (merged): 404'd demo.gif reference removed from README (real video is Phase 1), Discord badge placeholder → static badge with the real invite, honest ~15-min setup expectation, network & trust model in the quickstart, portal now binds 127.0.0.1 by default (LAN/phone is an explicit server.host: 0.0.0.0 opt-in; SECURITY.md updated), GitHub repo description unified on the one-liner.
• agentwire-website feat: permission modes for per-session permission control #2 (merged): hero + title/OG/Twitter/JSON-LD re-anchored from "Turn Claude Code into a Network" to "Talk to your AI coding agents. From anywhere.", honest setup copy on install/how-it-works. Build green.

Finding worth recording: demo.gif never existed in the website repo — no file, no reference, no git history. The README linked an asset that was never created, confirming Historian's read that the video mission was never completed. All three surfaces now pitch the same product.

Verification per the issue: curl -I https://agentwire.dev/images/demo.gif is moot (no references remain anywhere); fresh load_config() defaults to 127.0.0.1 (unit-tested); one-liner verbatim on repo description, README line 1, and site hero (pending deploy).

Next: Phase 1 — the 20–30s demo video (needs a human and a couch).

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Security gap closed: #247 shipped in #248 — origin checks always on, bearer-token auth required for non-loopback binds (auto-generated, one-time entry per device). The 0.0.0.0 phone-access mode the demo video will advertise is now honest. Verified live on desktop, tablet, and the full curl matrix.

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Restructured 2026-06-07:

• Demo video phase dropped — owner decision, not doing it at this time. Spikes will run on written/screenshot proof; revisit only if a spike demonstrably underconverts for lack of motion proof.
• Friction collapse broken out to friction collapse: degraded-but-instant first-run mode (<60s to first voice command) #251 as its own issue (degraded-but-instant mode, browser STT, no certs/GPU, five-stranger test). Phase 1 spikes here are gated on it.
• Phases renumbered: 0 funnel repair (done) → 1 launch spikes → 2 weekly review.

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#251 (friction collapse / instant voice mode) shipped via #252 — Phase 1 launch spikes are now unblocked.

What the funnel gets: fresh pip install → agentwire portal start → working voice in Chrome in under a minute, zero certs/GPU/models. The honest-setup README copy is updated to match. Note: the five-stranger install test from #251's original gate was waived by owner decision; if a spike underconverts on installs, that's the first diagnostic to run.

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Phase 1 deferred, Phase 2 stood up (2026-06-07)

Owner decision: launch spikes (Show HN relaunch, X thread, r/ClaudeAI) are on hold until the product is more streamlined and ready for people — no hard definition yet, just not now. Spikes already proved they generate views back in February; the open question was never reach, it's whether the product is ready for the attention.

Worth noting on the organic signal: the repo had 4 stars when posting stopped in February and has grown to 17 with zero promotion since — people who find it, like it.

Phase 2 is now live: weekly-stars scheduler task (Mondays 09:00) collects stars, GitHub traffic uniques/clones (vs. 21/fortnight baseline), PyPI installs, referrers, and external issues/PRs; writes ~/reports/agentwire-stars/<date>.md and emails a one-table digest. Per the verification bar: two consecutive missed reports = the process is dead and gets declared so.

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Phase 2 repair: the weekly review died on its first run — diagnosed, fixed, verified (2026-06-10)

The weekly-stars task failed silently on its first scheduled run (Mon 06-08): status=failed, duration=0, empty summary — the exact silent-death mode Phase 2 exists to prevent, caught two days in instead of 3.5 months later. Three stacked bugs, none task-specific:

1. In-place dispatch can't target agentwire-dev — ensure refuses to attach a session to a directory that's already the cwd of the long-lived portal/scheduler sessions (exit 6). Fixed live: the task now runs worktree: true.
2. Worktrees had no task definitions — this repo gitignores .agentwire.yml and git worktree add only carries tracked files, so the inner ensure died with "No .agentwire.yml found". Fixed live (projects.worktrees.copy_files) and as a new default in code.
3. write_task_context crashes on every slash-named (worktree) session — context file nests under a never-created directory. This likely broke all worktree-dispatched scheduler tasks, not just this one.

Plus the bug that made it invisible: failed dispatches recorded an empty summary because the scheduler choked on ensure's concatenated JSON output and discarded its error field. Failures are now self-describing in events/state.

Repo fixes in PR #265 (branch mission/gtm-phase-2; doesn't close this issue). After merge: agentwire rebuild && agentwire portal restart --dev.

Verified end-to-end: agentwire scheduler run weekly-stars → complete in 247s; first report written to ~/reports/agentwire-stars/2026-06-10.md; digest emailed. The Mon 09:00 schedule needs no further action.

From the inaugural report, two things worth eyes:

• news.ycombinator.com appeared as a referrer (4 uniques) — agentwire may have been mentioned on HN this week with zero promotion from us.
• Clone spike 06-06/07 (290+380/day) has bot signature, discounted. True external issues/PRs: 0. Stars: 17.

Next: the Mon 06-15 run is the first unattended test of the repaired pipeline; per the verification bar, two consecutive misses = declared dead.

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