Writing
Notes on building software
Honest takes on shipping products, indie hacking, and the realities of the tech industry. No fluff.
Why Your AI Agents Are Costing You 10x More Than They Should (And How to Fix It)
Most developers using Claude Code or building AI agents have no real idea what their agents cost. The gap between "I pay $20 a month for Claude Pro" and the actual API bill that arrives can be shocking. Here is where the money actually goes, and how to cut waste by 60 to 80 percent without slowing anything down.
The SaaSapocalypse Is Real: What Smart Developers Should Build Instead
AI agents are collapsing the build-vs-buy decision that made SaaS valuable. In January 2026, roughly $2 trillion in SaaS market cap evaporated in 30 days. This is not a cycle. It is a structural shift. Here is an honest look at what is happening, which categories are done, and what developers should actually build in a world where agents replace interfaces.
The Edge Computing Lie: Why Most Apps Do Not Need Edge Functions
Edge functions are being sold as the default deployment target for modern apps. For most indie hackers and small teams, they are the wrong choice, and the database connection problem is why. Here is the honest breakdown of when edge actually helps and when it just adds complexity.
The Vibe Ceiling: A Decision Framework for When to Stop Trusting AI-Generated Code
METR found that experienced developers are 19% slower with AI on their own mature codebases, but feel 20% faster. That 39-point perception gap is the vibe ceiling, and it hits every developer at a different point. Here is a practical framework for knowing exactly where yours is.
AI Code Review Is the New Bottleneck: Why Faster Code Is Not Reaching Production Faster
AI tools helped developers merge 98% more pull requests. PR review time increased 91%. Pull request size ballooned 154%. The bottleneck did not disappear. It moved. Here is why code review became the choke point in AI-accelerated teams and what to actually do about it.
Running Local AI Models for Coding in 2026: When Cloud Tools Are Not the Answer
Ollama hit 52 million monthly downloads in Q1 2026. Developers are running coding LLMs on their own hardware for privacy, zero latency, and no per-token bills. Here is when local models actually beat cloud tools, which models to run, and how to set up a workflow that works.
AI Wrappers Are Dead: What Smart Developers Are Building Instead in 2026
McKinsey reports only 3% of AI startups will survive the next two years. Google just warned that companies built around LLM wrappers have their check engine light on. The average AI wrapper has a 65% churn rate within 90 days. But developers who understand what comes after wrappers are building the most valuable software of the decade. The AI gold rush is not over. The easy money is.
The Micro SaaS Playbook: How Developers Are Building Profitable Products in Weeks, Not Months
The micro SaaS market is projected to grow from $15.7 billion to $59.6 billion by 2030. Solo developers are shipping in weekends what used to take months. But 70% of micro SaaS products generate under $1,000 a month. The difference is not the idea or the tech stack. It is the process. Here is the playbook for finding, building, and shipping a micro SaaS that actually makes money in 2026.
The AI-Powered Agency: A Developer Playbook for Selling AI Services in 2026
Y Combinator is telling founders to stop building SaaS and start selling AI-powered services instead. The pitch is simple: use AI yourself and sell the finished work for 10x what the tool costs. Developers are uniquely positioned for this because they can build the automation layer that makes it scale. Here is the practical playbook for starting an AI-powered agency as a developer in 2026.
The Developer Newsletter Playbook: How to Build a Newsletter That Actually Makes Money in 2026
TLDR grew from a side project to 7 million subscribers and an estimated $5-10M in annual revenue with a team of four people. Bytes built a massive JavaScript-focused audience that funds an entire educational platform. Developer newsletters are quietly one of the most profitable media businesses you can run, and they compound over time in a way that social media never will. Here is how to start one, grow it, and turn it into real revenue.
The One-Person Startup Just Hit a New Ceiling: What It Actually Takes to Scale Solo in 2026
Sam Altman predicts the first one-person billion-dollar company. Dario Amodei gives it a 70-80% chance of happening this year. Meanwhile, solo founders like Pieter Levels are pulling $3-5M annually with zero employees. The one-person startup is not a lifestyle play anymore. It is a legitimate scaling model. Here is what actually separates the solo founders who scale from the ones who stall.
Speed Is the Only Strategy: Why the Fastest Founders Win in 2026
OpenAI ships major updates every 4-6 weeks. Anthropic drops features that rewrite the rules overnight. A solo founder built an AI platform and sold it for $80M in six months. The market rewards speed more than it has ever rewarded anything else. If you are spending months perfecting before you ship, you are playing a game that no longer exists.
The Developer Freelancing Playbook: How to Land Clients, Set Rates, and Build a Business That Lasts in 2026
Freelance developer rates range from $40 to $200 per hour in 2026, but most developers who try freelancing quit within six months. Not because the work dries up, but because they treat freelancing like a job instead of a business. Here is the playbook I wish someone had given me before I took the leap.
Open Source as a Growth Engine: How Developers Are Using GitHub to Build Profitable Businesses in 2026
Open source is quietly becoming the best free marketing channel for bootstrapped founders. Your GitHub repo is a landing page, trust signal, and distribution engine rolled into one. Here is the playbook for turning open source contributions into paying customers, based on what is actually working in 2026.
Return to Office Is Not a Productivity Strategy: What Actually Makes Developers Effective in 2026
Fifty-four percent of Fortune 100 companies now require full-time office attendance, up from 5% in 2023. Yet 80% of those companies have already lost talent because of it. The RTO debate for developers has never been about location. It is about deep work, flow states, and whether your environment lets you think. Here is what the data says and what both companies and developers should do about it.
TypeScript 7.0 and Project Corsa: The Go Rewrite That Changes Everything
Microsoft just shipped TypeScript 6.0 as the final JavaScript-based release and is finishing the Go-native rewrite for TypeScript 7.0. The benchmarks are staggering: 10x faster builds, 3x lower memory usage, and sub-100ms watch restarts. Here is what Project Corsa means for your projects, what breaks, and exactly how to prepare for the biggest TypeScript change since version 1.0.
The Developer Talent Paradox: Why AI Is Making the Shortage Worse, Not Better
AI was supposed to solve the developer shortage. Instead, 87.5% of tech leaders now describe hiring engineers as brutal. Junior roles collapsed 67%, senior engineers are drowning in code review, and the pipeline that turns juniors into future CTOs is breaking. Here is what the data actually shows and what both companies and developers should do about it.
Local-First Software Is Winning: A Developer Guide to Building Without the Cloud
The cloud made everything possible. It also made everything dependent. Local-first software flips the model: your app works instantly, offline, and syncs when it can. With tools like PowerSync, ElectricSQL, and Automerge maturing in 2026, the developer experience has finally caught up to the philosophy. Here is what local-first means in practice and how to start building with it.
AI-Generated Code Is a Security Liability: What Every Developer Needs to Know in 2026
Veracode tested over 150 AI models and found that 45% of AI-generated code introduces security flaws. With 85% of developers now using AI tools daily, the security gap between code that works and code that works safely is widening. Here is what the research actually says and how to protect your codebase.
How to Build a Discord Bot with Bun and TypeScript in 2026
Most Discord bot tutorials still use Node.js and JavaScript. This guide takes a modern approach with Bun and TypeScript, covering everything from project setup to slash commands to deployment. Bun starts in under 15ms, runs TypeScript natively, and installs packages faster than you can read this sentence.