Steven Tey is a masterclass in how open-source software, exceptional design aesthetics, and a deep understanding of developer psychology can unseat a decade-old corporate monopoly.
In late 2022, Steven, then a Developer Advocate at Vercel, looked at the link management space and saw an industry frozen in time. Bitly, the market incumbent, had become bloated, expensive, and hostile to users: charging upwards of $35 to $300/month for basic custom domains, cluttering links with slow interstitial redirect screens, and ignoring modern developer workflows.
Steven built Dub.co (originally launched as Dub.sh) as an open-source Next.js project on GitHub. Within 18 months, Dub gained over 18,000 GitHub stars, processed hundreds of millions of link clicks for leading tech brands like Superhuman, Raycast, and Prisma, and scaled its commercial cloud platform to $35,000/month MRR ($420,000 ARR) with just a two-person team.
Phase 1: The Frustration with Legacy Link Shorteners
Every marketing team, creator, and software company on earth uses short links: for social media bio links, affiliate tracking, SMS campaigns, and QR codes.
Yet, by 2022, the tools available were relics of Web 2.0:
- Bitly: Charged exorbitant pricing, had a slow 2012-era interface, and locked basic custom domain features behind expensive enterprise sales gates.
- Ad-Laden Free Tools: Services like TinyURL or bit.ly free tiers showed intrusive redirect ads, looked unprofessional, and lacked detailed analytics.
- API Inflexibility: Modern developers building web apps couldn’t easily programmatically generate branded short links with custom Open Graph preview images or geolocation targeting.
As a Developer Advocate at Vercel, Steven was deeply immersed in cutting-edge frontend tooling: Next.js App Router, Tailwind CSS, Edge Functions, and serverless databases. He knew that with modern web primitives, he could build a link infrastructure platform that was 100x faster, infinitely more beautiful, and open-source.
Phase 2: The Open-Source Blitz (Dub.sh Goes Viral)
In late 2022, Steven published the entire source code of Dub on GitHub.
His launch strategy was simple:
- 100% Open Source: Developers could view every line of code, audit security, or self-host their own link shortening instance on their own cloud infrastructure for free.
- The “1-Click Deploy to Vercel” Button: Anyone with a GitHub and Vercel account could clone and deploy their own personal link shortener in under 60 seconds.
- World-Class Visual Polish: The UI featured buttery smooth animations, sleek typography, instant search, and real-time click maps that felt like a consumer luxury product.
The developer community on Twitter and GitHub went wild:
- Within 48 hours, the GitHub repository crossed 3,000 stars.
- Tech founders and developers started ditching Bitly and tweeting screenshots of Dub’s sleek dashboards.
- Steven won the trust of the developer ecosystem because he wasn’t trying to lock their data inside a walled garden.
Phase 3: The Monetization Blueprint (Why Companies Pay $49/Mo)
A common fear among open-source founders is: “If the code is free, why would anyone ever pay me?”
Steven understood the fundamental economics of open-source commercialization:
- Hobbyists and Students: Will happily self-host for free on a weekend. They cost zero in support and act as evangelists.
- Funded Startups and Enterprises: Have zero desire to manage Redis clusters, debug Cloudflare SSL certificate provisioning, handle database backups, or monitor server uptime.
In 2023, Steven launched Dub Cloud, a fully managed SaaS hosted on dub.co:
- Pro Plan ($24/mo): Unlimited custom domains, 10,000 monthly events, custom QR codes with company logos, geo-targeting, and iOS/Android app deep linking.
- Business Plan ($99/mo): 100,000 monthly events, team collaboration workspaces, custom 404 redirects, and API webhooks.
Companies like Raycast, Supabase, Vercel, Resend, and Tinybird eagerly signed up. Paying $49/month for rock-solid, zero-maintenance link infrastructure was a trivial expense compared to the engineering hours required to maintain their own self-hosted servers.
Individual / Self-Hosted: Free forever (open-source AGPL)
Dub Pro: $24/month
Dub Business: $99/month
Enterprise Custom: $499+/monthPhase 4: Acquiring Dub.co and Building The Attribution Engine
As Dub’s revenue accelerated past $20,000 MRR, Steven made a strategic brand investment: securing the ultra-rare, premium three-letter domain Dub.co.
He expanded the platform beyond simple link shortening into a Full-Funnel Attribution Engine:
- Dynamic Open Graph Images: Allowed marketers to dynamically generate custom preview images and titles for specific social links without touching HTML meta tags.
- Conversion Tracking: Integrated webhooks and analytics to track not just how many people clicked a link, but how many converted into paying customers.
- Programmatic API Generation: Allowed SaaS platforms to automatically generate unique affiliate and referral links for their users via a high-performance REST API.
Dub crossed $35,000/month MRR ($420,000 ARR) with blistering month-over-month growth and a team of just two people.
3 Playbook Rules for 0-to-1 Founders
1. Open Source Is the Most Potent Distribution Hack
If you are building a tool for developers or tech companies, open-sourcing the core product on GitHub creates immediate organic trust, viral word-of-mouth, and free code contributions. You don’t have to spend a dime on Google Ads when thousands of engineers are starring and sharing your repository.
2. Attack Decrepit Corporate Monopolies with Modern Design
Companies like Bitly, SurveyMonkey, and Eventbrite were built in 2010. Their interfaces are clunky, slow, and full of friction. By rebuilding these proven business models with modern UI/UX, edge speed, and delightful design, you can easily pull away their best customers.
3. Monetize Convenience, Not Code
Never worry about people self-hosting your free software. The customers with the largest budgets, fast-growing companies and marketing teams, will happily pay hundreds of dollars a month for hosted reliability, automated SSL certificates, and 99.99% uptime guarantees so their engineers can focus on core product work.