Building Fast Isn't the Same as Learning Fast

I think people are taking "ship fast" way too far.

As developers we can now go from idea to working app in an afternoon. AI coding tools made that real, and it's great. But the speed of the build tells you nothing about whether anyone needs the thing.

"Ship fast" was always about the feedback loop: get something small in front of real users, watch what they do, adjust. The build was the cheap part of that loop even before AI. Now it's nearly free, which makes it very tempting to skip the rest of the loop and go straight to launch.

I had that choice with my own app, Xyterna. I could have launched it earlier. The core was there, but a lot around it wasn't, so I held it back, changed direction, and launched a month later. Even now that it's live, the listening and adjusting hasn't stopped.

So yes, ship fast. Ship small, ship to real people, and learn from it.

Otherwise you might spend six months trying to sell something nobody wanted in the first place.