htmx.org / CEO of We Are So Back (same thing)

The social media platforms - Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, Discord etc - were all giving away free trials from the outset. They just lasted several years. We're going through something similar again now with LLMs.

Introducing Kids Paint Studio, brought to you by Buffering Studios, Inc. 7 (and counting) massive, entirely offline coloring catalogs for kids. No in-app purchases, no ads, no accounts, and absolutely *zero* data ever captured or recorded (not even Sentry/Bugsnag/Posthog analytics). There is no backend API. You buy it once, download the entire catalog and own it forever. --- This started with my kid coming to me every 5 minutes to clear an in-app purchase screen after clicking an ad intentionally designed to look exactly like the coloring app he was using. So I decided to build him something that didn't suck or try to monetize his little creative brain for "one-more-sale" Turned out he liked it. A lot. Like a lot a lot. And I liked it a lot a lot because I could trust it. So we kept going. My wife and I experimented with collections built around his favorite stuff. We figured AI could help us generate images and learnable information for an app we could trust. An app that tried its hardest to keep him inside it, with no deceptive in-app purchases or external links. It was tough. AI is not good at consistent image gen. After plenty of trial and error, we dialed it in for about 90% of the content. For the other 10%, I built per-catalog debug controls so we could review everything between the daily bottles, activities, and meltdowns. Funny side story: most of my wife’s animal-catalog reviews asked AI to change several scenes where the animal's "private parts" were really in focus. Nature is fine... GOOD, even.. and those parts exist. But AI's choice to randomly put them on such display was kind of bizarre. The funniest part? AI refused to make her changes because her requests included words like (change the pose to hide the) "penis". Instead it just noped out and refused to make any edits But I digress… The next big hurdle was the app stores. The apps were ready in early June, but we're still fighting to get them all approved. The App Store and Google Play keep rejecting our catalog builds as "spam" because each app uses the same driver code. Meanwhile, the current garbage kids apps littered with ads and in-app purchases are totally fine. Okay, sure. I understand what they’re saying. The app engine is the same. But the engine isn’t the product! It’s also not where the time, blood, sweat, and tears went. That’s in the catalogs: their pictures, information, organization, and the work required to make everything informative, educational, appropriate and not obscene. Every time I've pushed back, we've received another rejection. The repeated recommendation is to consolidate everything into one app and sell the additional collections through in-app purchases. But we're not going to do that because that's exactly one of the issues we’re trying to solve for. Or maybe they do realize it and that model isn't nearly as profitable. Maybe that's the actual beast we’re fighting when trying to build child-friendly apps that aren't dopamine-sucking slot machines. Something something show me the incentive and I'll show you the behavior. I don't know, draw your own conclusions So, while we originally planned to release every catalog at once, it looks like we’re starting with two: Bible and Heavy Equipment Bible will forever be free. It's a trust piece that lets parents try the experience. It shows you exactly what you'll get from every app we build. And if you don’t believe me, just ask Google Play or the App Store. They’ve made it very clear the engine is the same Since this whole ordeal started, we've had some really cool early-education ideas if we can get traction. Not the normal "replace me and teach my kid because I’m busy" tools, we want to build "we're actively teaching our kids and could maybe use software to help us" tools Hoping we can get approved and release the other catalogs soon! LIKES, RETWEETS AND TELLING YOUR PARENT FRIENDS IS GREATLY APPRECIATED! Godspeed, fellow parent soldiers

The social media platforms - Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, Discord etc - were all giving away free trials from the outset. They just lasted several years. We're going through something similar again now with LLMs.