How a late-night obsession turned into a SaaS

Poya Shad — Fri, 08 Aug 2025 12:08:30 +0000

You really shouldn’t have your phone in bed. But I can’t help myself.

Every night, long after I should be asleep, I find myself lost in an endless scroll. It's not TikTok, Instagram or even X.

Sometimes i go for hours. And if my wife catches me, hell brakes loose.

I have a confession to make: I doom-scroll real estate at night.

Gorgeous homes, dreamy interiors… and tragically, photos taken with a potato.

Why are these listings so bad?
And more importantly, where are the professional photographers?

Curious, I dove into the r/realestatephotography subreddit.

Every other post sounded the same:

“How do I find clients?”
“Where do I get leads?”

And that’s when it hit me. There’s a real need here, on both sides.

Agents want beautiful photos to help sell homes.
Photographers want reliable, paying clients.

So, as an experiment, I created a Reddit ad with a bold title:

“Find Clients Here.” And promoted the Ad in the subbreddit

I expected a few clicks. Maybe a couple of curious photographers.

Instead, signups started pouring in.

That’s how PropPhoto.com was born.

A platform that connects real estate agents with vetted photographers, streamlining everything from discovery to delivery.

What started as a late-night obsession turned into a real product.

A SaaS business.

One that solves a real problem for real people.

And it all began with doom-scrolling

I built a Fake Log Generator

Poya Shad — Wed, 25 Sep 2024 06:00:05 +0000

As developers, we've all been there: you're testing a log analysis tool, setting up a demo environment, or trying to debug a log-dependent application, and you need a bunch of realistic log data. But using production logs is out of the question due to privacy concerns, and manually creating fake logs is tedious and time-consuming.

What is Fake Log Generator?

Fake Log Generator is a web-based tool that allows developers to quickly create realistic, customizable log data for testing and development purposes.

It's designed to streamline the testing process for log-dependent applications while maintaining data privacy.

Key Features

User-friendly Interface: The clean, intuitive design makes it easy to generate logs quickly.
Customizable Log Formats: Tailor your logs to match various scenarios and application needs.
Privacy-First Approach: Generate realistic data without exposing sensitive information.
Time-Saving: Say goodbye to manual log creation or sanitizing production data.

How I've Been Using It

Here's a quick example of how I've been using it:

I select the log format that matches our application (in my case, Apache logs)
I customize the fields.
I specify the number of log entries I need
With a click, I have a set of logs ready for testing

Conclusion

In the world of development, small tools can make a big difference in our daily workflow. Fake Log Generator is one of those tools for me. It's solved a persistent problem in my testing process, and I imagine it could do the same for many other developers out there.