I was contacted recently by an entrepreneur who was convinced that if he could build a website that could connect to his drop-shipping provider, his wildest dreams would come true: A “set it and forget it”, money-generating app. I had to break the sad news to him that there’s no such thing as a “set it and forget it” thing anywhere in the history of humankind. Okay, maybe if you use Stonehenge as your stopwatch, but outside of that, nada.

A quick, non-critical reading of 4-Hour Workweek will convince you that you can build a business that is mostly “set it and forget it”, but even if the 4-hour workweek were attainable, it’s still not maintenance free (it’s 4 hours per week of maintenance, after all). But, of course, to build a sustainable business that requires only 4 hours per week of your time requires thousands of hours of development (sales, code, processes, relationships, maybe even staff, etc).

So if the 4-hour workweek is a pipe dream, what about the “set it and forget it” web dream? Not possible folks. Maybe a unicorn did it once or twice, but you need to remember: unicorns are not real.