The End of ScrapeForge
This post was supposed to be: Day 6 of building ScrapeForge 🛠️ But unfortunately I have to stop here. I am genuinely sorry to everyone who followed this journey and supported the project. I can no longer continue building ScrapeForge at this time. Why I am stopping? The reason is simple and honest. Lack of funds. I know this sounds like a common excuse but it is the truth. Quick recap: Yesterday...
Day 5 of building ScrapeForge 🛠️
Today felt like a breakthrough. While working on ScrapeForge, I figured out a reliable approach to reverse engineer backend APIs used by many applications. This allows data to be accessed directly at the API level before it is rendered on the frontend. What surprised me most during this process was how many applications, including large platforms, expose backend APIs with minimal protection or...
Day 4 of building ScrapeForge
Today was more grind than excitement. I completed the remaining work on the SERP scraper and then moved on to implementing proxy rotation. I decided to test free proxies first. I manually collected around 2000 of them and wrote a script to check which ones actually worked. After nearly two hours of testing, only 139 were usable. This made the trade-off very obvious. Free proxies cost time and...
Day 3 building ScrapeForge 🛠️
Today was focused on early technical validation. I started working on the SERP scraper using Playwright. After some initial success, I ran into captchas, IP blacklisting, device fingerprinting, and other anti-bot mechanisms. I experimented with making the scripts behave more like real users by adding delays and reusing contexts. While the scraper is not finished yet, the learnings were...
Day 2 building ScrapeForge 🛠️
Today was focused on risk and responsibility. I researched the legal considerations around this product and concluded that a properly defined Terms of Service will be required once backend features are finalized. After that, I initialized the repository and completed the initial project setup. Building fast matters, but building responsibly matters more. More updates soon.
Day 1 of building ScrapeForge 🛠️
Today was about laying the groundwork. I shared the build in public announcement, worked on improving my problem-solving skills, and created a detailed project brief to clearly define the scope of ScrapeForge. The goal was to reduce future rework and set a clean path from build to launch to marketing. I am also sharing the project brief template for anyone who wants to plan their product more...