Ask HN: I'm 15, won a grant to develop a suicide prevention app, what next?
Some background:
I'm 15 years old, attend high school, do well in terms of grades and extracurriculars (business clubs/competitions), and also am a pretty good front-end developer experienced with HTML/Jade,CSS/LESS, JS/jQuery/AngularJS, and Phonegap/Cordova. I've worked on several web projects in the past, such as http://teen2geek.com, and my portfolio is at http://krrishd.github.io, just to get an idea of what I can do in web development (not so good at the backend though).
I recently took part in a social entrepreneurship competition to prevent suicide, and I envisioned a specific app, and the idea won a grant. This app is somewhat similar to some social networks you've seen, and is a bit complex to develop for a front-end guy like me. The grant is a "micro-grant", so it isn't anything substantial, and I'm not sure if outsourcing can retain the quality necessary for such an app.
What do you think I should do?
159 comments
[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 156 ms ] threadI've created a github project here - http://github.com/krrishd/suicide-prevention
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/meteor-talk
It didn't seem like there's a "perfect" solution for this yet (in any realm--it's all still evolving).
For this application, meteor may be suitable, but keep in mind that you'll need to build a lot of your supporting infrastructure until Meteor 1.0 comes out.
Reasons not to use Meteor:
It is currently very difficult to accurately profile memory issues.
Simple html mixups can take half an hour to debug due to the fact that they'll only show up in production, and in minimized/uglified form.
MongoDB costs 'money' to scale properly (sharding across multiple machines with lots of memory (if your database grows).
Edit: This is not a simple project, so maybe meteor is asking for trouble since it's not very mature yet.
You could (carefully) curate a list of this sort of advice from people who have actually felt suicidal at one point or another and pop up a random message on demand in the app. Carefully, as most cheerful advice does not sound so good when you are depressed.
Anyway, I wish you good luck.
I suggest you open source all of it, and keep HN up to date on progress. List out what the product should do, and how you want to design your models. You'll get some solid feedback.
Web iterates fast, so I'd use web rather than jumping right into native. You'll be able to show your code to coders, and show your product to social workers and those who support at-risk people.
Also, Parse is owned by Facebook and has pretty solid, simple login and integration with social sites.
On the projectside: Cool that you would take your time and skills to work on a project like that. I had the sad experience of losing someone close through suicide, so... yeah. Thanks.
http://themoth.org/posts/stories/perfect-moments
And maybe reach out to other suicide prevention non profits?
Two reasons:
1. You're young and still figuring out what you love doing; no better time to experiment and learn. I still have fond memories over the php site I wrote in high school. You could visible tell which functions were written at the beginning of the project versus the end because you'll improve drastically. [1]
2. The project will be more successful with someone who cares for it. Hiring a contractor will make it difficult for you to maintain and improve. Contractors will also expect a specification with penalties if you need to change it. My guess is that you're still experimenting with what can best serve the community so this probably isn't a good fit for contracting as well.
[1] Recommended tech stack (optimizing for documentation and availability of help). Ruby, MongoDB, Heroku (or if ambitious, Linux on Amazon EC2 + nginx). Everything else is pretty similar so once you learn these, the concepts apply reasonably well.
p.s. If money is a concern, you should look into contacting some companies PR/DevRel people and see if they are willing to donate some compute time or services to your cause. (It's probably doing this after launch and getting a better sense of usage and will be easier to convince them that you're legit).
I work primarily with Python and Angular at the moment, but I can provide assistance in other areas as well. OP, if you'd like to take me up on this offer just connect with me on GitHub (link in profile) and I'll shoot you a message.
Considering the fact that you already received a grant, I would imagine you have a few details of what you want to build, but you will find the real tangles in the details.
I would greatly advise that you dive deeply into the various requirements and untangle the details and drive clarity throughout the design, before you start writing a lot of code.
Once you feel comfortable that you won't run into any big surprises and you understand your general feature set you should prioritize these features, I like to do the most risky and difficult features first, and then get started. You will of course have a lot of ground work to lay, but that could be counted as a feature.
After you have your first shippable set of code done, should take between 2 weeks and 2 months, shouldn't be perfect. Get it in front of someone that's relevant. As it will be hard to find somebody suicidal that also wants to review an app, probably somebody at a crisis center or a counselor that helps people in this situation.
After a few demos you should find plenty of improvements and features you never thought of, as well as defects. Now it's time to add these into your priorities and start over.
Good Luck, I hope this goes well for you. Let me know if you would like any further advisement, I would be glad to take emails and what not. I have been developing software professionally for the past 3 years.
I can do the literal translation, and I can surmise that it means a person who builds and designs UIs, but I always thought that was a designer, not a developer.
Javascript is the only thing on what you've just listed that's Turing complete, so look into Node.js, in addition to all the other Buzz Words you see in the rest of the comments.
I also think you should come at this with a dark sense of humor. You're not going to save many lives if you don't get attention, and you're not going to get anyone's attention if it's Just Another Web App. Tasteful gallows humor is a good way to grab the audience you're looking for.
Here's a good article about it, as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_and_back_ends
So many of the little hobby projects I've worked on over the years (long since abandoned) have provided a fantastic base for something else. A website I managed when I was a teenager taught me all sorts of server admin skills that still pay off 5 years later. When you're 15 you have absolutely oodles of free time (it might not seem that way now, but it will when you're working full time!). Make use of it!
This list of cognitive distortions and how to fix them might be relevant: http://www.apsu.edu/sites/apsu.edu/files/counseling/COGNITIV...
This was created by Dr. David Burns and is supported by research in cognitive therapy. The full information is available in his book "Feeling Good". The interactive medium could afford some interesting possibilities.
Another thing that I remember reading is that tracking your happiness level and sharing that information with others seems to improve mood. Somebody was experimenting with this on the web. Seems like a perfect fit for a social app.
I second the opinion that you should make sure that you pay attention to research. Some common sense approaches might be counter-productive. For example, the cliché: "suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem" can make suicide sound even better to the seriously depressed. Be suspicious of common sense here.
The key idea is that our thoughts control how we feel, not the events or surroundings of our lives. A person who is considering suicide often has a very different view of events because of their thought process. The idea of CBT is to change the way you think and by doing so you are able to feel differently about the events in your life.
However, I would never suggest that someone simply start applying CBT on their own with out some guidance. I am very nervous about how you want to make this a social application. Depression can be a very personal and embarrassing disease for a person and even positive encouragement can cause more depression.
Lets say we have a kid named Stan. Stan is a very depressed kid who is considering suicide. He manages to let his friend Bobby know that he has been considering killing himself. Bobby is shocked as Stan is a very bright and successful kid. Bobby tells Stan that he 'can't believe that Stan would want to do such a thing' and that 'he has so much to live for.' Bobby thinks that he is helping Stan, but Stan views this very differently. Stan thinks, 'No one understands me, Bobby is just saying that to make me feel better.' While the temporary relief of telling someone was something that Stan really wanted to do, in the end it only ends up making him feel more depressed.
The reason behind this sort of thinking is because of the Cognitive Distortions. Stan's perception of reality is vastly different because of them. It is for this reason that I am concerned about how you make this a social application. In my opinion the best thing you can do for a person who is considering suicide is to get them to a trained professional.
It seems DBT builds off of CBT.
[1] http://www.amazon.com/Learned-Optimism-Change-Your-Mind/dp/1...
[2] http://www.amazon.com/The-Optimistic-Child-Depression-Resili...
Yes, "self esteem" is again putting the individual up directly in front of themselves to examine and focus on which only brings existing problems into sharp center-focus. Depression and Pride both have a common denominator in too much self-absorption.
> "I learned a lot and will do better next time."
Both of those are pretty self-absorbed (which is not the same as vane). In both scenarios you are seen as the person responsible, even though the rejection came from someone else.
This could set someone up for any number of positive or negative effects, emotions, or actions, from long term depression or suicidal feelings to a burning desire to really improve themselves to actually become that unique and talented person they were told they are.
I certainly hated that growing up. It was years before I could believe I had done anything right, because people would say the same things either way.
But I think tokenadult was actually proposing something else: not focusing on oneself so much. Much like CS Lewis's concept of humility: "could create the greatest cathedral in the world, know it is the best, and rejoice in the fact that it is the most wondrous of all cathedrals; without being any more or less glad that he created it than he would be if someone else had created the cathedral."
Or to take another CS Lewis quote: "And every state of mind, left to itself, every shutting up of the creature within the dungeon of its own mind - is, in the end, Hell. But Heaven is not a state of mind. Heaven is reality itself." Focusing on self-esteem instead of the goal or substance at hand is shutting a creature within the dungeon of its own mind. That really is a great phrase for it.
(This is one of those things that when I say it, it sounds trivial, but I observe that there is a very pervasive cognitive bias to assume that stated goals === results, in a wide variety of contexts.)
A disclaimer: I speak out of personal experience with this topic, and I did not read most of the comments that you've already received (sorry, wish I had the time).
So here's my word of caution:
You must be aware that you are intentionally brainwashing yourself into a biased worldview by reading all of these books on suicide prevention.
Every book on suicide prevention has the premise that suicide is "bad", after all, that is why the author wrote it, and that is what they are trying to prevent.
It does not matter a lick how scientific their "data points are", if the premise that they are starting out with is based on a biased point of view.
You will join their ranks if you don't keep this in mind.
Therefore, in addition to all of the literature on suicide prevention that you read, I strongly recommend reading literature that supports suicide.
Books that support suicide use a different word, but it is the same thing. These books employ the same linguistic trick that books attempting to prevent suicide use: they use words.
Words have unspoken meaning associated with them, that only exists ephemerally in the culture in which they are used. You may or may not find this hidden meaning in dictionaries.
These two words have in fact the exact same meaning, when it comes to the end act. Their meaning only slightly diverges when you take the cultural connotation and circumstances surrounding their use. Nevertheless, they really should be treated (by you) as synonyms, because the reasons that the people you are trying to prevent from killing themselves are usually the same in each case.
Word #1: Suicide
Word #2: Euthanasia For your project, I will throw a devil's advocate accusation at you, and call you, and anyone in this thread who supports your cause, a terrorist and/or sadist. I will accuse you of in fact not helping people, but misguidedly (due to complete and utter ignorance on your part) torturing people by encouraging them to experience more suffering.Further, I will claim that unless you can see this point of view, your project will be an utter failure, and will not achieve any success beyond what existing measures have achieved.
To understand suicide, you have to understand wanting to kill yourself, and you cannot understand this intellectually, you have to have experienced it yourself (or have a great "emotional imagination", aka ability to empathize). How can you help anyone with a concept that you have no understanding of yourself? That is the road to failure.
Suicide is a very rational reaction to life. I've seen people call those who want to kill themselves "selfish", when it's clear that it is the other person who is selfish, and wants the person to stick around and suffer, only to spare themselves suffering.
So, to start you off, you may want to compliment your reading by familiarizing yourself with real suicide notes, before you even think about writing a single line of code. Here are some I found via some googling (I cannot vouch for their authenticity though):
http://theholydark.wordpress.com/2012/08/28/some-painfully-e... (references this page that is no longer online: https://web.archive.org/web/20130112214925/http:/&#x...
^-- A perfect example of the ignorance that I mentioned, thank you.
To Krish: remember, people who contemplate suicide are constantly faced with such ignorance, and so in the cultures where such attitudes are common, suicide happens unexpectedly (and this is most of the world). Then people "wish they could have said how much they loved them", etc. etc.
Especially when we're discussing teenagers, who haven't even lived one fifth of their expected lifespan.
OK, you're certainly entitled to your opinion and to disagree with mine.
Especially when we're discussing teenagers, who haven't even lived one fifth of their expected lifespan.
It was only a short time ago that it was common in Europe and elsewhere for 15 year olds to be starting families.
Today, many 15 year olds (and younger), commit suicide.
What exactly are you seeking to accomplish by emphasizing his age and your arbitrary requirement on what the "right amount of life" is?
...and who haven't finished cognitive development.
All of this said, and saying this as someone who has contemplated suicide at least once in my life, I don't know much much any kind of app is really going to help. The times in my life that I've been depressed enough to think thoughts like that, I doubt I would have pulled up an app and consulted it.
Same deal with "Suicide prevention hotlines". My feeling is that many people who contemplate suicide don't want to be talked out of it, and won't call the hotline no matter how well publicized it is or whatever. When you're suicidal, you're in a totally different mental state where the normal rules just don't apply.
Which leads back to my saying that you can't really understand suicide, and why I think the GP post was valuable.
> All of this said, and saying this as someone who has contemplated suicide at least once in my life, I don't know much much any kind of app is really going to help.
I gently agree. I hope it gets some research and oversight. And, if it works I hope it takes off.
> Same deal with "Suicide prevention hotlines". My feeling is that many people who contemplate suicide don't want to be talked out of it, and won't call the hotline
The Samaritans tend to say that they're not a "suicide prevention" hotline for that reason. They even say that they'll stay on the phone with you as you die if that's what you want. They say they just listen. This is for exactly the reason you mention - people don't want preachy "don't do it" advice, but they might want to just talk to someone.
> When you're suicidal, you're in a totally different mental state where the normal rules just don't apply.
Yes. And sometimes all that's needed is a small diversion, a bit of distraction, to allow the person to make it through the night without the attempted suicide, and to thus get help from doctors in the morning.
> Which leads back to my saying that you can't really understand suicide, and why I think the GP post was valuable.
I don't understand my own suicide attempts. I certainly don't understand the completed suicides of friends and acquaintances. I'd be foolish if I pretended to understand the completed or attempted of people in other nations (with different cultural expectations and so on). But GPs post (while it may have had a germ of useful information) is just weird and misleading.
Most people contemplating suicide are not in a position where euthanasia would be considered - they're suffering from some mental health problem. "Wanting to kill yourself" is not a rational reaction to life events. At least, not for most of the people who complete suicide. Some relatively minor interventions (a low interest loan of $4,000; some good debt advice; better lawyers and a decent legal system; housing advice; etc) would prevent many suicides. To suggest that suicide is a rational choice when the person is not capable of making a rational choice about life is cruel.
And on this point: > To understand suicide, you have to understand wanting to kill yourself, and you cannot understand this intellectually, you have to have experienced it yourself.
Not all people who attempt suicide have the same mindset. I know people who have attempted suicide (one guy's face is disfigured due to a self-inflicted gun shot) and they do not even remotely suggest that suicide could possibly be anything but bad.
Yes, that's a great point. There are a variety of viewpoints to consider, and it's important to understand the context in which they all occur.
I'm sure the person you're referring to did not have that opinion a few moments before pulling the trigger, otherwise he wouldn't have done it. The surviving individual cannot be said to be the same one who pulled the trigger, in spite of appearances. His life went on, and in a radically different direction.
But I think that's exactly where suicide and euthanasia are different, where you claim they are synonyms. Euthanasia is for people that are suffering, in pain, and cannot get better. Suicide, in the context of depression and other mental illnesses, is for people that are suffering, in pain, and can get better.
Not to suggest that the suffering or pain is any different, but that the available treatments are very much different. I would argue that your points of view are more akin to terrorism and/or sadist, because you're peddling the kind of information that leads these people to truly believe that they can't get better.
And that's why a project, that the OP is attempting, is virtuous IMO. I agree with other commenters here that there are some very very important considerations though, and it should not just be released onto the world without very careful scrutiny, both legal and medical.
I'm sorry, but where did you find the Guidebook To Life that lays out the precise rules of what is and isn't an acceptable time for suicide? And what is the reason we should follow the advice in this book as opposed to some other book that says the exact opposite?
Regarding mental illness, that is in fact some of the worst type of illness you can get (I personally feel it is the worst type). You can carry on just fine without an arm or a leg (or no arms and no legs![1]), but mental illness is a monster that will truly crush the very core of your being and make life agony 24/7.
Now you come along and say, "But wait! It Gets Better™!"
Except that's not true.
What you mean to say is: "Wait, it might get better!"
Except, depending on the mental illness, the chances of it getting better in any meaningfully amount of time can be zero.
There are different levels of depression, for example, and many people who say they've been depressed haven't actually experienced depression at its worst. Depression is one of the worst "illnesses" that can happen to you (at its extreme), and it _will_ kill you if it's severe enough (by getting you to kill yourself).
The type of agony associated with such a disease is unimaginable to someone who hasn't experienced it, and isn't even necessarily recallable to someone who experienced it in the past, but it is real, and you'd better respect the person who tells you that they want to kill themselves.
In such situations, I believe that the "right answer" (if there is one), is the one the person chooses to make, whether it is to kill themselves, or not. The possibility of their situation improving is not in any way a justification for them to continue the very real and immediate torture that they're going through.
At that point it's up to them whether there is anything left that they want to continue staying alive for or not. That's a decision that they have to make, and I respect it, regardless of what they choose.
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=nick+vujicic
Your point is; how can you call suicide a bad or evil thing if it relieves pain and suffering in exactly the same way that the traditional definition of euthanasia does.
My point is; suicide prevention isn't just about demonising suicide, the act, but about helping people not get to the point where they feel/know that suicide is the only option.
Suicide/euthanasia is a tragedy. It means that we, as a society, have failed someone. Whether that is an inability to cure cancer, or cure depression.
I'm not qualified or experienced enough to really comment on the rest, so I'll leave it at that.
I very much appreciate you reaching out in such a way. It helps to know that we're working toward an understanding of perspectives, instead of arguing. Thank you.
That is not quite my point. I do accept the possibility of a "dishonorable" or "reckless" suicide, but I suspect such cases are the exception, rather than rule, given the significant taboo suicide carries today.
My point is; suicide prevention isn't just about demonising suicide, the act, but about helping people not get to the point where they feel/know that suicide is the only option.
Re: "isn't just about demonising suicide", the demonization of suicide is one of the key issues that I was getting at in my post. It hurts everyone involved. Family members wake up one day only to find their loved one dead all of a sudden. This happens because of said demonization. It wouldn't happen if suicide weren't illegal, if people weren't locked up against their will when they say they are suicidal, etc. A suicidal person should be free to talk about killing themselves with those close to them without fear of loss of liberty, social ostracization, and chemical rape. A son, father, daughter, mother, wife, husband, should be able to speak openly with their family about wanting out. Unfortunately, it seems our society is not mature enough for such conversation, and thus suicide becomes an agony for all involved. The person who killed themselves went through extra guilt and agony, and those surviving are also left feeling guilty, indignant, upset, angry, depressed, etc.
It doesn't have to be that way.
Re: "not get to the point where they feel/know that suicide is the only option", I can't comment on that without a concrete example. People get sideswiped and end up close to the edge. It can happen gradually, or very suddenly. Each situation is unique, and must be treated as such.
So, now that we've got the hyperbole and name-calling out of the way: Many suicides are based on a misguided notion that the suffering is endless an interminable. I happen to actually support assisted suicide and "the right to death", but I'm painfully aware that the decision is rather irrevocable and requires strong safeguards.
If an app or a book convinces you to not commit suicide, the likelihood is high that what you're experiencing is strong emotional pain that is quite likely to subside. If your ideation is based on actual incurable physical pain, or merely the idea that you have lived a full life, a simple app or book will not convince you otherwise.
To the OP: Work with a suicide prevention organization. The Trevor organization is a great place to start. (Disclaimer - I've worked with them for a while, presenting to LGBT youth)
Touché, I agree the hyperbole was unnecessary and over the top (probably got generated by some emotional trigger that I didn't do a good job of moderating). Just to clarify though, I _don't_ "encourage countless needless deaths".
If an app or a book convinces you to not commit suicide, the likelihood is high that what you're experiencing is strong emotional pain that is quite likely to subside.
I agree with this and the rest of your comment. :)
> For your project, I will throw a devil's advocate accusation at you, and call you, and anyone in this thread who supports your cause, a terrorist and/or sadist. I will accuse you of in fact not helping people, but misguidedly (due to complete and utter ignorance on your part) torturing people by encouraging them to experience more suffering.
How does this help discussion?
Indeed. I didn't say or think that it was.
> Euthanasia is distinct from suicide, and is usually treated as such by people campaigning or working in the area.
Yes, they treat it differently and invent various criteria and judgements on what is and isn't an acceptable reason to commit suicide.
Frankly, it's all a mis-mash of opinions and cultural beliefs. If you were in Japan a few centuries ago, you'd think it was perfectly rational and reasonable to gut yourself just because you shamed yourself (or your family/lord).
And frankly, you'd be just as right about that opinion as the folks working in Euthanasia are about theirs today.
>How does this help discussion?
The hyperbole doesn't help (I addressed this in another reply to someone else), but there was a point there that just wasn't stated very eloquently, and that is that our present culture (in the United States and many other places) does, many times, actually result in people suffering more than they otherwise should, were suicide/euthanasia a more normalized and talked about practice.
This is rarely the case, and is mostly seen in instances of euthanasia where the sufferer has no chance of life improvement due to an irreversible decline in health, and thus requests an assisted suicide.
Whereas those who are suicidal due to depression tend to take the irrational view that their mental anguish will never cease. This is bias towards extreme pessimism, not rationality.
I don't see much that an anti-suicide app could do in the cases where it is a rational decision, whereas it probably could provide relevant information and perspective to people who need it. So that sounds like an overall good thing (so long as it doesn't invoke forced hospitalization or drug changes or other backfiring interventions).
http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/25/in-defense-of-psych-tre...
The result 'want to go on living' is not a goal you want to reach.
(Where 'X' might be phoning a helpline, downloading an app, talking to a therapist, doing a thought experiment).
But that doesn't mean your desire to commit suicide is valid and coherent and respectable. We, the living, agree that living is better than non-living, that happiness is better than sadness, and that health is better than illness.
When someone is too ill to physically take care of themselves, we take over and act where possible "in their best interests" until they recover.
When someone is suicidal, they don't want to go on living, and offering help isn't enough because they won't reach out and take it. The only respectable act on our part is to consider them incapable and take over control of their life, assume their best interest is 'survival' and help them towards that.
anyone in this thread who supports your cause, a terrorist and/or sadist. I will accuse you of in fact not helping people, but misguidedly (due to complete and utter ignorance on your part) torturing people by encouraging them to experience more suffering.
Why would you assume that the goal would be to dump the person right into a life of suffering, instead of to help them out of the suffering as well? Current suicide prevention interventions don't always help as much as they could, but that's rather because they are implemented poorly than because they want people to suffer.
By which I say absolutely nothing about the ethics of, or the validity of emotional arguments for, committing suicide.
If it was a purely random or logical decision how can you explain the differences in suicide rates among different groups (e.g. males)?
> you have to understand wanting to kill yourself
I 'm willing to bet that everyone has had that thought at least once in their life.
The app was described as a "social network". As someone who has experience with suicide (both from my perspective and from losing people), I have to question what a difference that will make. How exactly does it work? If he can't explain, perhaps a mockup of the UI might answer a lot of questions.
Of course it has the potential to help someone. Everything has potential but how realistic is that? The chance that this will make a difference seems really low to me.
I hate to be the negative guy on HN but suicide is a serious matter and I can't see why anybody would give grants to 15 year olds to build 'apps' to 'prevent it'.
Usually, no. But we're not dealing with "will my photo sharing startup succeed?"
>unless suicide is an area where you have more potential to cause harm than to do good
It's extremely difficult to give good advice to a suicidal person. Almost everything can be interpreted as negative. Your dealing with someone who is in a dangerous mind set. Even telling someone "it'll get better" can make it worse. This is why I stressed the importance of experience.
Some information: http://www.reddit.com/r/SuicideWatch/comments/1cep2h/psa_wha...
Um, yes, you have serious potential to cause serious harm.
1. I am in no way experienced with suicide, I just thought this idea up for a contest, but it actually won, and I felt the obligation to at least try to make it a reality.
2. This app is not really aimed at people already dealing with severe stages of depression, many organizations and suicide hotlines are already doing that well. This is more towards people only starting to feel issues that could worsen to lead to suicide, catching the issue early on.
Again, sorry if that's how it seems, but I'm just trying to help out in any way that I could possibly.
I'd strongly advise you message the mods in /r/SuicideWatch. They can advise you on what to do, they're great people. If you don't, you could easily end up doing more harm than good.
These organizations are for much more than that. The National Suicide Prevention Line is there for your "smaller" problems too. There are more, too. Best of all, these are trained professionals, not 15 year olds.
Take it all with a grain of salt. What I'd suggest to get started is create a public github project for it, put together some wireframes and sequence diagrams (publish them in the github project) so that people can see what it's meant to look like and how it's mean to work. Then just start coding.
Post the github project here on HN and ask for contributors. Keep a curated list of features, tasks and bugs in the github project and let people pick them up and help you build it.
Rule #1 though, don't let people get you down. Everyone has an opinion and we software people can be pretty harsh, especially when, frankly, we're just arguing our opinion rather than fact.
Rule #2, done is better than perfect. What's your Minimum Viable Product? Build that, maintain tunnel vision on completing that, then worry about everything else it could do.
Now whatever happens next, it will only be valuable. You will only learn things from that point, outsourcing is not an option when you're willing to learn. Because this is an opportunity to learn, it is not an opportunity to succeed.