Lately I have been spending time building a few small apps for myself. Nothing big, just simple tools that make everyday tasks a little easier. What surprises me is how much simpler it has become to put something useful together with the tools (AI and agents) available today. A few years ago even small ideas felt heavy because you had to think about setup, hosting, and costs. Now the gap between having an idea and seeing it work is shrinking quickly.

But the real question is: what are you building for?

When new tools came in during the 80s and 90s, they solved everyday problems. Spreadsheets made it easy to calculate expenses without redoing everything on paper. Word processors meant fixing mistakes without starting over. Email made communication instant. Each was simple, direct, and solved a clear need. If you were a techie that time, blogging was even more popular

That is the way I want to approach AI today. The way I see it, we don’t always need to buy or subscribe to yet another app or API tokens. Sometimes we can make our own. For example, if I want to break down my bank statement and see where my money is going, I can create a small tool that does just that without having to ask AI to look through my statements(!never). I can use it to build a small tool. It doesn’t have to be complicated, and it doesn’t have to be for sale. If it helps me, and maybe a few friends or family or extends to my outer circle, that’s more than enough.

One of the apps I’ve put out is Civic Pulse Dashboard. This is so that I can check what I have within my own vicinity. I don't have data yet(Except for AQI), the layout is ready. Will dig deeper to scrape data, (PS: this is how I envison a utopian world :) Will write more later).

The mindset I’m experimenting with is this: start with your own problems, use the tools you have today, build something small, fine-tune it, and put it out there if you like. If someday it grows big enough to help many people, then it can become larger. Until then, solving your own problems is a good place to begin. At least that’s what I am trying to do.