Why this site exists
I'm Hongan, a former software engineer with 5 years of experience. I now build in public: small products and websites made with AI, with the process and numbers shared openly.
Things I've shipped: Follower Lens, an open-source Chrome extension for X (100+ users); a WeChat savings-tracker mini program (253 users); the open-source vibe-wrapped; and 11 niche websites.
Why WhyItEarns: when I build a site, I don't want to know what's trending. I want to know why people pay for something, where the money and users come from, and whether I could build one. So every day I break down one AI product that already makes money, and I publish the reasoning, the evidence, and this site's own growth.
Method: every revenue figure is labeled with its type and evidence level (payment-verified, founder-reported, third-party estimate, or my inference), with a source and date. If I can't find a number, I say so.
Editorial independence: sponsored placements and paid submissions are always labeled. Paying changes placement and review speed, never listings or scores.
X: @yaohongan2025 · Website: yaohongan.com
Evidence levels
- Payment-verified
- Pulled from a payment provider integration (e.g. a TrustMRR-verified Stripe connection).
- Founder-reported
- Stated publicly by the founder (post, interview, open dashboard), with a link.
- Third-party estimate
- An estimate published by a third party; treat it as a range, not a fact.
- My inference
- My own inference from public signals, with the reasoning shown.
Where no number can be found the page says “Not found”. Numbers are never made up or filled in by AI.