Does everything that annoys you eventually turn into "there should be an app for this"?
There’s the cheesy line "with great power comes great responsibility," and I can’t quite shake when I think about how many products I mentally sketch in a week. How how i can use AI to build product around it given enough time.
A running list of those I've actually sat with:
- A shared calendar that doesn't force everyone to already be on the same app
- A cab-booking flow that doesn’t mean checking three apps to find the cheap one that’s actually nearby
- Something that makes AI actually useful for how my kids learn, not just another screen they're on
- A means to divide group expenses and track personal finances better
- Something that tracks all the warranties and receipts so I don’t lose them a year later
I know most of these exist in some form already. That knowledge has never once stopped the itch – I still design my own version in my head, anyway. What really prevents these from going anywhere is bandwidth. I can only build one thing at a time, and the rest just sit in a notes app, quietly piling up.
Are you always creating new problems and thinking about building products for them too?
And when you do, is it the “does this already exist” question that kills the idea?
Or running out of hands stops you from building it?
Replies
I have the same habit. The useful filter for me is not “does this already exist?” but “does the current solution still make people complain?”
I keep the ideas in one list and score them by frequency, pain, and how easily I can reach the users. Most ideas disappear after that. The few that survive are worth testing with a very small prototype before committing months to them.