I've been a fan of Wufoo for a while now, which was only enhanced when I learned that the name originated as a combination of the authors' favourite bands and is even expressable as a wacky math equation: (Wu-tang - tang) + (Foo Fighters - Fighters) = Wufoo! Ryan Campbell posted a lengthy Web App Autopsy feature to their site way back on June 26th, 2007, which just popped up on our radar courtesy of the esteemable Greg Wilson. It's a great read if you either a) run a web app company, b) are planning to run one, c) are curious as to what goes into running one, or d) all of the above. The few things I found most noteworthy:

• Don't launch your webapp in December, unless you're doing it to make January's sales look particularly good.
• Language choice doesn't matter: pick the one you like and get on with building it already.
• 1% is a pretty consistently advertised figure for the conversion from free to pay accounts. Only inflate this number if you're about to do a dog and pony show for a VC, otherwise you will only have yourself to blame when you manage to achieve 1%.
• The one number that's missing here which would help to provide a sense of scale is the actual user base of each app. It's almost like pulling a Michael Moore: the murder rate in the US is way higher than in Canada (they have 10x the population, but sssssh! Don't tell anyone or the numbers are less impressive!)
  
• Remember that, along with a bigger user base comes a higher support cost. Look at RegOnline's support calls/day compared to even FeedBurner's.
  

Thanks to Ryan for the great post, and to the rest of the crew credited in the article for lending their time. I'd love to see how some of our Canadian friends like ConceptShare and Freshbooks stack up - is there a Scott or Mike in the house?