Launch

A launch is a set of links people will click once. Each click must land on something that loads, explains itself, looks right when shared, and is measured.

<skill-dir> below means this skill's own folder. Run its scripts from the project root so output lands in the project, not in the installed skill.

1. Make the destination ready

Run the audit against every URL you will share:

node <skill-dir>/scripts/page-audit.mjs https://example.com https://example.com/feature
node <skill-dir>/scripts/shoot.mjs https://example.com --full

Fix before announcing:

• Share card: og:title, og:description, a 1200x630 og:image that loads over https, twitter:card = summary_large_image. Check how it renders: paste the URL into the platforms' card validators or a private message to yourself.
• Title and description say what it is and for whom in plain words.
• First screen at 390px answers what it is, who it is for and what to do, with a working primary action.
• Server-rendered content (the audit's "server text"), so link unfurlers and answer engines see more than a shell.
• Favicon, theme-color, a real 404, no console errors, fast first load on mobile.
• Analytics on the primary action, verified arriving (instrument if installed), with UTM or ref parameters planned per channel.

2. Build the kit

Put it in one folder (launch/ or docs/launch/). Contents and formats in kit:

• Share card rendered from HTML/SVG source with render-gate.mjs, committed with its source. The gate fails a card whose font fell back, whose copy drifted from copy.md, or whose text is cropped.
• Demo media: 3 to 5 screenshots at real sizes, and a 6 to 15 second clip of the core action if motion helps. Build the clip as an HTML composition and render it with film.mjs, so a fix is an edit and a re-render (film). The product in a card, bento, device or clip is a capture from the live product or from shoot.mjs, placed as an image. Draw the frame. Do not draw the screen. Every number sits in that capture or in the agreed copy file. A number from a marketing note that is not in the copy file does not appear. Framing rules are in kit.
• Copy: one-line description (60 characters or fewer), a short paragraph, a longer description, the X/LinkedIn post, a Show HN or community post if it fits, a changelog entry. Rules in copy.
• Tracker: a CSV of where you will post or submit.

Before anything goes out, score the card, screenshots and clip with web-design's review rubric if it is installed, from your own renders at feed size. Only a ship verdict goes out.

3. Write copy that survives scrutiny

Specific, verifiable, in the product's voice. Lead with what someone can do now. Every number has a source; someone else's numbers are labelled as theirs. No guarantees you cannot keep. Run deslop's scan on every piece. Vary the angle per audience rather than pasting one blurb everywhere.

4. Distribute deliberately

Order the tracker by fit, not by count: the communities where the product's users already are come first. Respect each place's rules (self-promotion limits, required formats, no voting rings). Draft the material, then send or submit within the user's authority for each destination; reuse authority already given for that action and target. Update the tracker with status and the live URL as each goes out.

5. Measure the week

Before launch, save the queries: visits by ref/UTM source, primary action conversions, signups. After 24 hours and 7 days, read them out: which channels sent people who did the thing, not just traffic. Record what to repeat and what to drop.

Never

• Fake testimonials, invented user counts, borrowed metrics presented as your own.
• Buying votes, asking for upvotes in a way the platform forbids, sockpuppets.
• Submitting the same narrow piece to many catalogues as spam; list the whole product once, well.
• Announcing before the destination passes step 1.