iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Three days before launch, I finally asked whether the Terms of Service was actually in my signup flow. It wasn't. Not for any of the 50 people getting access Tuesday. I wrote up the whole weekend of hunting my own mistakes. 🐾 billbuildsai.substack.com/p/pibbl-open...

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

You can write flawless code and still get blocked by a stranger's checklist. Resubmitted Pibbl to Meta's review again. The code works. There's just a queue. Open beta starts Sept 15 either way. billbuildsai.substack.com/p/i-can-fix-... #BuildInPublic

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

I can't write code. 30 years in tech & it's still my biggest skill gap. Last week I rebuilt a tool that's been dead since 2012, deployed it, & had it running before lunch. Asked an AI what it'd take, then built it together. Wrote it all up, bugs included 👇

billbuildsai.substack.com

I Resurrected a Dead Audio Tool in an Afternoon, and I Can't Write Code

How a guy whose biggest skill gap is coding shipped a working, deployed audio tool between breakfast and lunch.

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

I never took a course. I opened ChatGPT, asked if my idea was even possible, and started building. If it sucked, I could delete it. New post: what I actually skipped to start building (it's not the tools), and the one thing you can't skip. #BuildInPublic #VibeCoding #NotADeveloper

open.substack.com

What I Skipped to Start Building (and It’s Not What You Think)

Spoiler Alert: it wasn't the tools. It was the coursework, the jargon, and the permission I didn't ask for.

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

I didn't build Pibbl once. I built it 6 times. V1 was a lie: one HTML file, every button fake, every post typed by hand. No AI, no backend. Just a picture of what I wanted. That fake version taught me the most. 56, not a developer. Full story in the newsletter 👇 open.substack.com/pub/billbuil...

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Everyone says "build an MVP." Nobody explains what minimum actually means. I thought it meant fewer features. It doesn't. It means fewer assumptions. Wrote about the version of Pibbl I built before I understood that. It was the wrong build. open.substack.com/pub/billbuil...

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Built a real app with AI. It worked. Then I asked: can one user see another's data? That became a week-long security sprint. A working app and a leaky app look identical. That's the trap. billbuildsai.substack.com/p/it-works-i...

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Unpopular opinion: Obsidian does nothing for your AI's memory. It's a pretty window, not a brain. Claude just reads text files off disk. What actually mattered was backup, not branding. Fixed that instead of buying an app. Full story: open.substack.com/pub/billbuil...

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billbuildsai.bsky.social @billbuildsai.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

I'm 56, not a developer, building an AI company solo. Everyone thinks the age is the plot twist. Backwards. The technical part is what AI handles now. Knowing what's worth building gets better with age. The tech was never the hard part. Starting was. open.substack.com/pub/billbuil...

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