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I agree with the point generally but: > I haven't seen any real competitor of YouTube, or Figma, or Google, or Instagram created solely with AI. Is a ridiculo

by bko 2mo ago

I agree with the point generally but: > I haven't seen any real competitor of YouTube, or Figma, or Google, or Instagram created solely with AI. Is a ridiculous set of products to expect competitors for. First all but 1 rely heavily on network effects. YouTube is a low cost provider. Think about it, they provide unlimited high quality video storage for free. They process 500 hours of content every minute. Google and Instagram have a huge network all users benefit from. AI can't help you bootstrap this network. The only one that's fair is Figma, and considering Figma is down 30% from IPO price (much lower from ending day close), it's fair to say there are competitors to Figma, including the LLMs themselves. That begs the question: what is product? Is "an app for designers to change style and communicate with developers" the product? Or is the product "to make websites look pretty and well organized"? The former, Figma is great. But if the product is the latter, LLMs are a real threat. No one would bother building a "better Figma" today, why would they? They would just solve the problem Figma purports to solve

jeremyjh 2mo ago
That list is a pretty high bar but you can make it as low as you like and it’s still crickets.
- bko 2mo ago
  Read the second half of my response. The next Google won't be a search engine with 10 blue links. Why would anyone create slightly better legacy apps. For instance, Claude is 100% a competitor to Salesforce and there are go to market companies like Clay that manage outreach of a salesforce. Small companies can easily spin out a simple system that can source people to reach out, track follow ups, help w copy and even coordinate email.
- bensyverson 2mo ago
  That’s because no one wants to admit that their product is vibe coded… But there are plenty of vibe coded products out there making money from actual users.
rogix 2mo ago
Yeah, I agree that YouTube, Instagram, and so on are a high bar. Not even the people who created these companies twenty years ago would be able to replicate the success of these products. My goal with this article was to highlight the hidden complexities behind any meaningful product. For example, how will I store the user info and settings? What if the user regrets buying my product? What if it is too complex? Who are the target users? And so on. Many questions that no single prompt can satisfactorily give us answers to without putting real thought into the thing, and none of this is shown in the demos we see around. Anyway, I loved all the insights I got here. Thanks for taking your time to write a reply.
- enos_feedler 2mo ago
  I also think you under appreciate the value of toy software. We’ve spent 20 years talking about serious practices for making serious software but what if the next 20 years is about making personal toys that scratch our own itch? Perhaps LLMs fill this need quite well and they aren’t suppose to replicate what already exists.
owebmaster 2mo ago
OpenAI tried to create a Instagram competitor and failed miserably

by bko 2mo ago

jeremyjh 2mo ago

That list is a pretty high bar but you can make it as low as you like and it’s still crickets.

bko 2mo ago
Read the second half of my response. The next Google won't be a search engine with 10 blue links. Why would anyone create slightly better legacy apps. For instance, Claude is 100% a competitor to Salesforce and there are go to market companies like Clay that manage outreach of a salesforce. Small companies can easily spin out a simple system that can source people to reach out, track follow ups, help w copy and even coordinate email.
bensyverson 2mo ago
That’s because no one wants to admit that their product is vibe coded… But there are plenty of vibe coded products out there making money from actual users.

rogix 2mo ago

Yeah, I agree that YouTube, Instagram, and so on are a high bar. Not even the people who created these companies twenty years ago would be able to replicate the success of these products. My goal with this article was to highlight the hidden complexities behind any meaningful product. For example, how will I store the user info and settings? What if the user regrets buying my product? What if it is too complex? Who are the target users? And so on. Many questions that no single prompt can satisfactorily give us answers to without putting real thought into the thing, and none of this is shown in the demos we see around. Anyway, I loved all the insights I got here. Thanks for taking your time to write a reply.

enos_feedler 2mo ago
I also think you under appreciate the value of toy software. We’ve spent 20 years talking about serious practices for making serious software but what if the next 20 years is about making personal toys that scratch our own itch? Perhaps LLMs fill this need quite well and they aren’t suppose to replicate what already exists.

owebmaster 2mo ago

OpenAI tried to create a Instagram competitor and failed miserably