My fiancé works at Anthropic.
asserted
fiancé → work → Anthropic
I began the year with a flurry of vibe-coding projects: starting by canceling my Squarespace account and building a new personal website, and proceeding to build a suite of tools for creating daily briefings, a journaling companion, and a Platformer archive.
asserted
I → begin → briefings
The projects were so useful, and so easy to create, that initially I did not spend much time thinking about how unattractive they were.
asserted
they → create → time
I’ve continued to use those tools intermittently.
asserted
I → continue → tools
Over time, though, their lack of polish came to nag at me.
asserted
lack → come → me
And so I took notice when, in March, Raycast announced Glaze — an all-in-one vibe-coding app for the Mac.
asserted
Raycast → take → Mac
Where most coding tools are programming generalists, Glaze was built with the express purpose of building (and sharing) desktop apps.
asserted
Glaze → cod → apps
It was not the first to this idea — Wabi, whose founder Eugenia Kuyda I interviewed here last month, does the same thing for mobile apps — but as someone who does most of my work on a laptop, I found Glaze more immediately appealing.
asserted
Glaze → interview → laptop
Particularly given Raycast’s track record — its launcher app is one of my favorite and most-used pieces of software.
asserted
app → give → software
I added my name to the waitlist and forgot about it.
asserted
I → add → it
Then, at the beginning of June, my invitation showed up in my inbox.
asserted
invitation → show → inbox
Last week, Glaze opened up to all users.
asserted
Glaze → open → users
It includes a free tier with a one-time bundle of credits that will let you build an app or two; after that you'll need a Pro subscription — $20 a month at launch — which refreshes with 200 credits monthly and lets you buy more if you run out.
asserted
you → include → more
In my first month, I built three apps that I’ve been using to accomplish various tasks.
asserted
I → build → tasks
All of them involve productivity in one sense or another, though only one has any practical utility that extends beyond what was already available in the App Store.
asserted
what → involve → Store
Still, I have found the process of making Mac apps delightful, even when what I have made is extremely silly.
asserted
made → find → what
And while ultimately my conclusions about the next generation of vibe coding don’t extend far beyond “it’s fun to make things” … it’s fun to make things!
asserted
it → extend → things
And that has made me modestly more confident that there is a future for hyper-personalized software, at least in the short term.
asserted
me → make → term
So with that, here are a few notes on my early efforts to usher in the SaaS-pocalypse.
asserted
notes → usher → pocalypse
By far the most ridiculous app I have made so far is called Nightwing, after the DC superhero.
asserted
I → make → superhero
Recently, in an effort to watch less YouTube, I have begun reading a comic book or two before bed.
asserted
I → watch → bed
My original comic-book phase had taken place in middle school; I hadn’t picked up a new one in 30 years.
asserted
I → take → years
But something about the profusion of AI-generated slop in all my social feeds had made me desperate to see and pay for some handmade human art, and so a couple months ago I bought subscriptions to Marvel and DC’s respective comic-book apps and began digging into what I had missed.
asserted
I → generate → what
One superhero whose stories I found myself enjoying was Nightwing — Batman’s original Robin, all grown up and leading a team of superheroes in various world-shaking conflicts.
asserted
myself → find → conflicts
Around the time I got access to Glaze I had the amazing, terrible idea of creating a Nightwing-themed to-do app.
asserted
I → get → app
To-do apps are the classic first vibe-coding project, and there is almost never any good reason to make another one.
asserted
apps → cod → one
(I can’t imagine anyone meaningfully improving on Todoist.)
asserted
anyone → imagine → Todoist
Still, I find myself changing to-do apps roughly every six months for aesthetic reasons, and for the relief that comes from starting fresh with a blank slate of projects.
asserted
that → find → projects
Within a few minutes of using Glaze, its advantages over a pure coding app like Claude Code became apparent.
asserted
advantages → use → Code
Glaze starts with a working Mac app template, which lets you skip lots of prompting and scaffolding work.
asserted
you → start → prompting
It compiles and installs the app automatically — another big time saver.
asserted
It → compile → app
It calls image-generation models natively, which Claude Code doesn’t.
asserted
Code → call → which
And perhaps most helpfully, you can edit your app while it’s open — even drawing a circle around specific elements you want to change to guide the coding agent.
asserted
you → edit → agent
You can publish your app to Glaze’s store if you want, or browse other people’s creations to find inspiration.
asserted
you → publish → inspiration
For the most part I have found apps in the store pretty boring — featured suggestions include a PDF reader, a subscription tracker, and a Claude usage monitor.
asserted
suggestions → find → reader
At the click of a button, I can generate an image of a Nightwing-esque character doing any task that’s on my list: sending an email, buying groceries, getting an MRI.
asserted
that → generate → MRI
When I mark it completed, comic-book-style “boom!” and “pow!” animations fly across my screen.
asserted
animations → mark → screen
A widget at the bottom of the app offers a synopsis of a random issue of the Nightwing comic book, while the “issue number” at the top of the app tells me what day of the year it is.
Is any of this remotely necessary?
asserted
any → offer → this
Does it represent a copyright violation and an indictment of the safety guardrails of the LLM provider I am using to generate these images?
asserted
I → represent → images
In the meantime, though, my little app has succeeded where no previous to-do app has to date: making my chores fun.
asserted
chores → succeed → date
…and 61 more, not listed.
The Aporia
