Personal software is the next Rolex

Hello again, my friend,

Earlier this week, I found this new app, Wabi. It’s the first product in the world that creates personal apps for you. They work from day one, genuinely. It’s unbelievable. A single line of text can create an entire app in minutes (but still in beta, so it won’t be perfect in 100% of cases).

Less than 10 years ago, the same results required teams and a lot of money.

People are using it to create whatever they need, directly from X/Twitter. Here are some examples.

This is just a taste of what’s on their Twitter account, and it’s like magic.

It’s taking the concept of “personal software” and making it very real.

Today, I’d like to share this concept with you, along with context on where the world is going and how you might best prepare yourself.

Let’s lock in.

For years, we were told: “There’s an app for that.” It was Apple’s slogan. It was true. Everything from calculators to games to social media was built across a variety of apps. Still is. But there’s a twist now. Fast-forward, and most of these apps were purchased by 5 or 6 big players that dominate each space.

But apps are rigid, so we had to adjust the way we work to fit them. If you’re thinking that new companies pop up all the time creating new software for us, you’re right. But still, it’s a company creating an app for us. It’s not truly personal.

In one of the examples above, he created an app to improve memory retention for people with ADHD, specifically in the Duolingo style. It's a cool concept that doesn’t exist. It’s 100% his app, and he’ll decide how it works and what changes.

The theory is that software will be like this for all. Eventually, it’ll be a commodity that’s for expression and status as much as it is for doing things (a utility).

It’s not like there are 10 t-shirts and we all have to pick one. No, there are thousands. But we’re all choosing between (basically) Spotify or Apple Music for our music-playing software.

You and I can buy all kinds of shirts, jackets, or watches. They can be cheap, warm, and made of whatever material we want. Or they can be expensive, also warm, but “our style,” so we spend more for one jacket over another (even though they’re both basically doing the same thing).

We don’t need a watch to tell the time, but millions of different watches are bought and sold every year, from $30 to $30,000.

Just like how watches provide the same utility as our phone (telling time), but we buy them anyway, software will also be created with thousands of variations to achieve the same outcome.

We’ll pick and choose our software based on which fits “our style,” just like our clothes. It won’t be just 2 or 3 options for the same outcome anymore .

It can be as “simple” as aesthetics.

Apps like Share Aura are literally just for tracking and sharing your run to social media. But they use certain images for sharing that reflect a trending style/taste, the images people see when posted to social. To be clear, the app’s popular and winning market share from popular fitness apps like Strava.

The same utility can be achieved in thousands of different ways. An app that tracks a run and plots it on an image is not all that impossible to build these days. Wabi might even be able to make one. But the images themselves are a big selling point.

Because they let people express themselves in a way that reflects their taste (like a watch might even though our phone can tell us the time anyway).

Using the app is a form of expression that operates like fashion does. It shows others our tastes and lifestyle, and there’s a status-seeking element as well. But having to stick with rigid, impersonal apps created by companies limited this expression. It was never really personal.

With apps like Wabi being the first to make personal software very real and accessible, “personal software” is set to explode.

The world is commodifying almost everything. It’s not just that Rolex watches and Birkin bags appear all over social media (making them feel like they’re not so rare anymore).

And now that even getting jacked, looking young, and being thin are more or less commodities you can easily buy, what’s the next big thing?

Personal software.

The fact that I can speak into my phone and have all my problems solved is something not everyone can do (yet). Creating 100 images that match the current trends on my IG, generated in minutes, is something not everyone can do yet.

Just like how plastic surgery used to be just for celebrities, Rolexes were just for CEOs. These personal mini-apps are still super rare, but extremely compelling.

So, the next commodity that lets us demonstrate our uniqueness, elevate status, and open doors for us is, personal software, and it’ll help people level up the way dressing well, being in the right room, or having a big follower count might do the same.

This isn’t necessarily just about AI anymore. We’re past that. It’s about getting started toward the next big thing that can help us achieve more in our careers and life. In this case, it’s personal software. Not an app for that, an app for you.

Thanks as always for reading. See you next week!