I tried to build a todo app a few years ago with a similar thesis -- that the problem with todo apps was triaging the list.
So we built an app that did it for you, just like yours, using machine learning and AI (and some simple rules based on due date and expected time to do the task).
Turns out people don't want to pay for that, even at $2/mo. We even had group features, so that a parent could put tasks on their kid's list, or a group of students could use it for a group project, or a team at work could use it to coordinate team tasks.
We also had templates -- tell us you're a single person who lives alone, and we would auto-add tasks like washing the sheets and cleaning the toilets. Or we could add a daily exercise routine or even a daily bible study if you told us you were a religious Christian.
Feel free to take these features. I hope you have better luck than I did.
karmakaze
A ToDo app isn't interesting now unless it has an AI behind it to get things done.
cjimesh
This is super cool. But there's a very high likelihood that your past self would not have used this tool. For the simple reason that you wouldn't want company information going out to a third party.
Any plans to open source the harness/skill?
show comments
nater5000
You are nuts if you think anybody in the audience you're targeting will spend $10 per month on a TODO app that you can literally prompt ChatGPT to build for you and handle on your behalf for $20 per month lol
Like, you do get that ChatGPT can be quickly integrated with Gmail to send you a daily email, right? And for those with a bit more gumption, you can hook it up with an additional service to manage a proper task list for you.
Am I missing something?
show comments
vector_spaces
You need to do some serious work on your presentation, both in your write-up here and in what you show on your homepage.
You spend far too much time interrupting the flow of your write-up describing the product with biographical asides and implementation details. I would place each of these in their own sections/paragraphs -- first few paragraphs describe the product, the next few describe how you did it, the last is for you to talk about your background. This is roughly in order of what your readers are prioritizing and skimming for.
Next, what is shown on the landing page looks like a trivial to-do application with additional polish. Only from reading your write-up do I know it's somewhat more sophisticated than that. I'm not a designer so I can't provide guidance here, but there should be some signal that this app is doing more if you want to command even half of what you're asking pricewise.
And for the love of all that is good, you need to drop the bracketed parentheticals. They are an eye-sore and make your writing painful to read and skim.
Parentheses signal to the reader that while their contents are not essential to understanding the sentence, they might provide useful additional detail. Therefore each time you use one, you impose a little extra friction for the reader. You are asking them to hold a little extra information in mind to understand the sentence.
If your instinct is to bracket something, usually it's a sign you should simply leave it out. But if you really can't imagine leaving it out, then a bracket is probably inappropriate anyway. Most of yours fall into the former category. I would budget at most 2 parentheses for a write-up like this. Most of your sentences contain one, and some have two!
show comments
nekooooo
why, oh why, is everyone's first llm-assisted AI app a todo list? why are we obsessed with these productivity tools?
tra3
With respect, that's a wall of text.
show comments
privacyishuman
Nah, I'm not paying to give away my data. But I do really want a good tasks app that is self hostable, end to end encrypted, with great client side apps. Maybe I'll reverse engineer things 3 and make an Android version.
show comments
quicklywilliam
I love that you made this, and that you told your story about why. Clearly a lot of thought went into it, both leading up to and during its construction. Thank you!
Like others, I'm skeptical about the business model. That's not really a knock on you (and I wish you the best of luck), but rather with the whole ecosystem of these kinds of apps. There are three big problems:
- Everyone and their aunt is trying to sell me monthly subscriptions for a few bucks. These add up, both in terms of $ and cognitive overhead (yet another subscription I need to remember to cancel if I stop using it...)
- I don't own this system, I'm just renting it. This is a trade-off I'm less and less willing to make for a whole host of reasons including my ability to vibe code my own thing, open source, enshitification (or, perhaps more likely, you deciding to abandon this project in the future) etc
- All the usual concerns about data security and privacy are heightened right now in this era of super-capable hacking agents and super-creepy AI companies
As a user of things, vibecoding is the most exciting thing about AI. I can make anything I want to use, built exactly as I please. As a maker of things, vibecoding is the most damning thing about AI. Anyone can re-make anything I've made, built exactly as they please.
show comments
RGS1811
I converted my post-it based task tracker to an iOS app. It has no subscription, no data leaves your phone, and it costs 2 USD. It’s got no AI features but you can add tasks with siri by way of a shortcut.
Much less ambitious than what 3anddone is trying to do. But If you’re interested, check it out. It’s called “Grask”.
F7F7F7
What happens when my ADD riddled brain dumps 500 tasks that are either artifacts of procrastination or a new shiny problem that I want to solve but shouldn't be in this thing?
show comments
gillesbertheau
I kind of like the idea because it gives you a different angle of using AI specifically for one area. I think that's the key for a lot of products instead of being extremely broad. However just by intuition I would argue that its to simple and to expensive for this. Do you have plans of building it out to make it the best in this area?
show comments
harshalizee
App monetization is wild these days.
$9.99/month for a todo app with email that was generated with AI.
Meanwhile, an AI subscription starts at $20/month and you can vibe code your own version to suit your preferences and free forever.
I tried to build a todo app a few years ago with a similar thesis -- that the problem with todo apps was triaging the list.
So we built an app that did it for you, just like yours, using machine learning and AI (and some simple rules based on due date and expected time to do the task).
Turns out people don't want to pay for that, even at $2/mo. We even had group features, so that a parent could put tasks on their kid's list, or a group of students could use it for a group project, or a team at work could use it to coordinate team tasks.
We also had templates -- tell us you're a single person who lives alone, and we would auto-add tasks like washing the sheets and cleaning the toilets. Or we could add a daily exercise routine or even a daily bible study if you told us you were a religious Christian.
Feel free to take these features. I hope you have better luck than I did.
A ToDo app isn't interesting now unless it has an AI behind it to get things done.
This is super cool. But there's a very high likelihood that your past self would not have used this tool. For the simple reason that you wouldn't want company information going out to a third party.
Any plans to open source the harness/skill?
You are nuts if you think anybody in the audience you're targeting will spend $10 per month on a TODO app that you can literally prompt ChatGPT to build for you and handle on your behalf for $20 per month lol
Like, you do get that ChatGPT can be quickly integrated with Gmail to send you a daily email, right? And for those with a bit more gumption, you can hook it up with an additional service to manage a proper task list for you.
Am I missing something?
You need to do some serious work on your presentation, both in your write-up here and in what you show on your homepage.
You spend far too much time interrupting the flow of your write-up describing the product with biographical asides and implementation details. I would place each of these in their own sections/paragraphs -- first few paragraphs describe the product, the next few describe how you did it, the last is for you to talk about your background. This is roughly in order of what your readers are prioritizing and skimming for.
Next, what is shown on the landing page looks like a trivial to-do application with additional polish. Only from reading your write-up do I know it's somewhat more sophisticated than that. I'm not a designer so I can't provide guidance here, but there should be some signal that this app is doing more if you want to command even half of what you're asking pricewise.
And for the love of all that is good, you need to drop the bracketed parentheticals. They are an eye-sore and make your writing painful to read and skim.
Parentheses signal to the reader that while their contents are not essential to understanding the sentence, they might provide useful additional detail. Therefore each time you use one, you impose a little extra friction for the reader. You are asking them to hold a little extra information in mind to understand the sentence.
If your instinct is to bracket something, usually it's a sign you should simply leave it out. But if you really can't imagine leaving it out, then a bracket is probably inappropriate anyway. Most of yours fall into the former category. I would budget at most 2 parentheses for a write-up like this. Most of your sentences contain one, and some have two!
why, oh why, is everyone's first llm-assisted AI app a todo list? why are we obsessed with these productivity tools?
With respect, that's a wall of text.
Nah, I'm not paying to give away my data. But I do really want a good tasks app that is self hostable, end to end encrypted, with great client side apps. Maybe I'll reverse engineer things 3 and make an Android version.
I love that you made this, and that you told your story about why. Clearly a lot of thought went into it, both leading up to and during its construction. Thank you!
Like others, I'm skeptical about the business model. That's not really a knock on you (and I wish you the best of luck), but rather with the whole ecosystem of these kinds of apps. There are three big problems:
- Everyone and their aunt is trying to sell me monthly subscriptions for a few bucks. These add up, both in terms of $ and cognitive overhead (yet another subscription I need to remember to cancel if I stop using it...)
- I don't own this system, I'm just renting it. This is a trade-off I'm less and less willing to make for a whole host of reasons including my ability to vibe code my own thing, open source, enshitification (or, perhaps more likely, you deciding to abandon this project in the future) etc
- All the usual concerns about data security and privacy are heightened right now in this era of super-capable hacking agents and super-creepy AI companies
As a user of things, vibecoding is the most exciting thing about AI. I can make anything I want to use, built exactly as I please. As a maker of things, vibecoding is the most damning thing about AI. Anyone can re-make anything I've made, built exactly as they please.
I converted my post-it based task tracker to an iOS app. It has no subscription, no data leaves your phone, and it costs 2 USD. It’s got no AI features but you can add tasks with siri by way of a shortcut.
Much less ambitious than what 3anddone is trying to do. But If you’re interested, check it out. It’s called “Grask”.
What happens when my ADD riddled brain dumps 500 tasks that are either artifacts of procrastination or a new shiny problem that I want to solve but shouldn't be in this thing?
I kind of like the idea because it gives you a different angle of using AI specifically for one area. I think that's the key for a lot of products instead of being extremely broad. However just by intuition I would argue that its to simple and to expensive for this. Do you have plans of building it out to make it the best in this area?
App monetization is wild these days. $9.99/month for a todo app with email that was generated with AI.
Meanwhile, an AI subscription starts at $20/month and you can vibe code your own version to suit your preferences and free forever.
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