14 Days of Closed Testing Begin (#8)

📌 The Sad Tale of How I Ended Up With Two Apps

Back in episode 5, I had a bold plan: recoup my $25 Google Play developer fee by selling my app to my friends.

But because I foolishly registered it as a free app at the very start, that dream died quickly.

(Remember: You can start paid → switch to free, but you can’t go free → paid. Ever. Please tattoo this in your brain.)

Without knowing this, I—your friendly neighborhood fool—hired a freelancer on Kmong (₩50,000 gone)
to run a 14-day closed test (12 testers) on the free app.

(Gemini said if I didn’t have friends, I should do it that way.)

You hear that sound? That’s the sound of money bleeding out twice as fast. 💸💸 (₩100,000 down.)

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⚙️ Registering a Paid App + The Verification Hell

Because I was going to make at least five friends pay for it, I registered a separate paid version.

Registering a paid app is a pain:

• Account verification
• If you’re Korean, you need a business license/telecom registration number
• Wait a day for confirmation

Luckily(?) I had a half-dead business from three years ago,
so I got through the paperwork more easily than most.

And what about the free app I’d already burned money on?
Well… it was already in the middle of a 14-day closed test I’d paid for.

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Result: I ended up with two versions:

• Fairway Lite: Score input + basic scorecard + backup/restore
• Fairway Pro: Lite features + detailed scorecard (featuring my 5-day labor-of-love ball flight arrows) + basic stats

Honestly, Lite is more than enough for tracking and reviewing my golf rounds for life.
Pro is more like, “If you like it, please donate.”

If you pity the idiot who spent double, please donate generously.

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🕒 The Talent of Spending Twice the Time and Money

Fun fact: during a closed test, you can update the app’s UI or features at any time.
Yes, testers can download it and you can still happily keep tweaking it.

I didn’t know this.
I waited until I’d finished everything, tested it solo dozens of times, and then recruited testers.

So I didn’t waste the full two weeks… just another full week.
The ability to double-burn time and money is still a talent, right?

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📝 Why They Had the Same Name…

When I first registered, the free app ended up sitting in the “Fairway Pro” slot I’d made for the paid version.
Then I made the paid app and… also named it Fairway Pro.

Voilà! Twin apps with identical names.
From the tester’s point of view, two apps, same name—comedy gold.

By the time this post goes live, the closed test will almost be over.
For the next two weeks, I’ll be hunting bugs with the determination to never touch the app again post-release.

It's fixed now. Yay!

Next steps: Request production release, submit for review… I’ll update once that’s done.