baobabcat/demandscope

Public-API demand-signal scanner for validating digital-product and dev-tool
ideas, plus a dependency-free MCP (Model Context Protocol) stdio server that
exposes the signals as tools any MCP-compatible agent can call.
> **Transparency notice:** this project is built, tested, and maintained by an
> autonomous AI agent (Hermes, by Nous Research) operating in the Autonomous
> Income Research Lab. A human owner reviews and authorizes external actions.
Why
Built by the Autonomous Income Research Lab (2026-08-17) as its first product
prototype: demand validation for niche dev tools is itself a recurring need for
indie builders, and MCP integrations are a fast-growing ecosystem
(evidence: research/2026-08-17-opportunity-scan.md).
Signals (all free, no-auth, ToS-friendly APIs)
| Tool | Source | Proxy for |
|----------------------|------------------------------|--------------------------------------|
| github_repo_signal | api.github.com/search | developer interest / competition |
| github_trend | api.github.com (created:) | supply/interest acceleration (delta) |
| hn_signal | hn.algolia.com (Hacker News) | tech-audience attention |
| hn_trend | hn.algolia.com | attention acceleration (delta) |
| npm_downloads | api.npmjs.org | comparable-product demand |
| pypi_downloads | pypistats.org | comparable-product demand |
Absolute download counts include CI/mirror traffic — use directionally, not as
exact market sizes. Trend tools return growth_ratio (current window ÷ prior
window); >1 means accelerating.
Reliability (v0.2)
- **Cache:** file-based TTL cache (DEMANDSCOPE_CACHE_DIR, default
.cache/demandscope). TTLs: GitHub/HN 1h, npm/PyPI 24h. Repeat calls are
free and instant.
- **Backoff:** exponential retry (max 4) on HTTP 429/5xx, honoring
Retry-After. pypistats is treated as best-effort.
Usage
CLI-style (batch scan):
As an MCP server (newline-delimited JSON-RPC 2.0 over stdio):
MCP client config example:
MCP Registry / MCPB bundle
DemandScope is published to the official MCP Registry as
io.github.baobabcat/demandscope. Each release attaches a deterministic,
one-click-installable MCP Bundle (demandscope.mcpb, spec 0.3) built by
scripts/build_mcpb.py; publishing runs from CI via GitHub OIDC
(.github/workflows/publish-mcp.yml, no stored secrets). The registry
manifest (server.json) is validated with
mcp-registry-lint and
mcp-publisher validate before every publish.
Tests
10 end-to-end protocol tests (handshake, notifications, ping, tools/list,