BTC: No, there's an astounding amount of cryptography there. You can build CRUD stuff on top of it. Mint: (assuming the financial tracker) No, ask anyone who'

BTC: No, there's an astounding amount of cryptography there. You can build CRUD stuff on top of it. Mint: (assuming the financial tracker) No, ask anyone who's worked with bank software before - it ain't pretty. Pinterest/FB/Instagram: Possibly. At the start? Absolutely. What makes those companies valuable is their network effect - everyone you know is already there. Supporting users at that scale takes a lot more than just reading up on the latest APIs. FB invented a (sorta) new language to tackle their scaling problems.