Building in Public

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• The Vibe Life: Building Smart Keys for Mac

  Building in Public, Productivity, Smart Keys, Techy

  Apr 24, 2025

  I didn’t realize I was about to enter the “vibe” industry when I started building Smart Keys. All I really wanted was a way to sound fluent in languages without doing the hard work. Let’s be real: learning languages is tough. So, I built an app that lets me fake my english fluency until I… Read more

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• Store Conversion? More like Store Distraction.

  Bragging, Building in Public, Ranting, Smart Keys

  Feb 2, 2025

  Apple’s polished and carefully curated Benchmark Metrics are an illusion, designed to impress on paper but often disconnected from real-world performance. In other words, BS. Apple lays out a glossy percentile system, letting you compare your app’s metrics to others in the same category. It shows if you’re brushing shoulders with top performers (the 75th… Read more

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• No-BS Friday Metrics: Store Conversion Rate

  Building in Public, Ranting, Smart Keys, Techy

  Jan 24, 2025

  App Store gurus love to talk about ASO tricks and how to squeeze every bit of conversion juice from the app store. But what if I told you it doesn’t really matter? Smart Keys store conversion rate is over 50% while the best apps barely scrape 8%. So either I’m a wizard or this is… Read more

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• Why I’m airing my dirty laundry goals in public

  Building in Public, Productivity

  Dec 2, 2024

  I used to think goals were private, write them down, forget about them, repeat. Turns out, saying them out loud can flip everything upside down, sometimes painfully, but mostly for the better. But I realized that when I shared my goals publicly, something happened… 1. The Kombi Adventure A few years ago, I told a… Read more

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• Did Apple copy me?

  Building in Public, Ranting, Smart Keys

  Sep 30, 2024

  As a non-native speaker, I relied heavily on Grammarly for years. I couldn’t write a simple text without its proofreading capabilities. Recently, though, I found myself turning to ChatGPT with a simple prompt: “proofread this.” It did a much better job, but the constant copy-pasting was a hassle. I tried various AI keyboards, but most… Read more

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• SF2.LA: Part 1

  Building in Public, Cycling

  Nov 17, 2023

  Diego from 2 months ago: “No-code platforms are BS.” Diego from today: “No-code platforms are mostly BS. Except one, which is now my new BFF. 😉” I once firmly believed that low/no-code platforms couldn’t create novel technologies. However, I had the opportunity to challenge this belief while developing a solution for a non-profit campaign. The… Read more

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• Kombina.me

  Building in Public, Sustainability

  Nov 13, 2019

  Once I had a VW Bus Kombi (my last “car”), a slightly magical, slightly cursed thing that carried me everywhere. I drove friends to lunch, traveled, slept inside it, and probably did a few other improper things I won’t mention here because my mom might find this blog one day. In 2014, when I decided… Read more

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• The Monster Poster

  Building in Public, Ranting, Travel, Youper

  May 20, 2016

  We went to São Paulo to meet the big companies. IBM turned up to sell. Read more

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• Selling the Kombi

  Building in Public, Kombi, Travel

  Feb 17, 2014

  The Kombi season is ending. I'm not selling her to just anybody. Read more

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• Abandoned Project n144

  Building in Public, Sustainability

  Sep 25, 2011

  Place ‘Dangerous Section’ signs near the Sapiens Park curve. I’ve seen many accidents, and the city is not doing anything. If someone else has an accident there, the blame will also be mine. Read more

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