Software was meant to be selfish.

Software began selfishly.

Before software became an industry, it was something tinkerers made because they wanted it to exist.

Linus Torvalds wanted a better operating system for his own computer, so he started Linux. Years later, when the Linux kernel needed a new way to manage its own code, he built Git.

Guido van Rossum spent a Christmas holiday building the programming language he wanted to use. It became Python.

Richard Stallman and other early hackers continually modified their own editors and tools because the software in front of them wasn’t quite right. Emacs grew out of that culture: don’t tolerate the tool—change it.

Thomas Knoll wrote a little program to display grayscale images on his computer. He wanted it for himself. That program eventually became Photoshop.

This was normal.

Software was clay.

If your computer didn’t do what you wanted, you made it do what you wanted. The distance between user and developer was tiny. Sometimes there was no distance at all.

Then we industrialized software.

We discovered that one piece of code could serve a million people. Then a billion.

And inevitably, we stopped building for a person and started building for an average.

The question changed from: “What do I want my computer to do for me?” to: “What behavior can we get millions of users to repeat?”

Engagement. Retention. Daily active users. Time on site.

Software stopped being selfish on behalf of its user and became selfish on behalf of its owner.

We want to build for the second.

The problem is that engagement software has learned there are two versions of you.

There is the you of right now. The one who wants another video, another notification, another piece of sugar, another five minutes.

And there is the you who exists across time.

The you who wants to be healthy. To do meaningful work. To spend time with friends. To call your family. To sleep. To create. To actually be there for your life.

Modern software is extraordinarily good at serving the first one.

We want to build for the second.

Software can become clay again.

AI gives us an opportunity to go back.

Not backwards technologically. Back to the original relationship between a person and their computer.

Software can become clay again.

A starting point instead of a finished product. A codebase meant to be pulled apart, rewritten, reskinned, and molded around you.

Limited edition. 1 of 1.

Your habits are different. Your body is different. Your job is different. Your family is different. Your aesthetic taste is different. Your weaknesses are different.

Why on earth should your software be the same?