iamladi.dev — writingEssays and field notes from Ladi — on agents, the splitting UI, and 18 years of catching waves early.https://iamladi.dev/en-usWe rebuilt the whole game once. The mistakes survived the rebuild.https://iamladi.dev/writing/aaru-post-mortem/https://iamladi.dev/writing/aaru-post-mortem/Book of Aaru took five years, one restart, and a small studio to ship. Where the years went, why restarting didn't fix the decisions, and the 1%-loop lesson.Thu, 02 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTretroEveryone builds local-first second brains. I'm building the opposite.https://iamladi.dev/writing/loombrain-build-log/https://iamladi.dev/writing/loombrain-build-log/Local-first is the sacred cow of second brains, and the wrong architecture for the agent era. LoomBrain lives online so agents can reach it while I sleep.Thu, 02 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTlogEveryone says taste is the moat. That's the cope.https://iamladi.dev/writing/taste-is-the-cope/https://iamladi.dev/writing/taste-is-the-cope/Taste is the thing AI supposedly can't take from you. But taste is just an evaluation function, machines already learn those, and the edge is running the loop.Thu, 02 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTessayI built the AI pivot from the inside. It didn't work.https://iamladi.dev/writing/the-pivot-that-didnt-work/https://iamladi.dev/writing/the-pivot-that-didnt-work/Every crypto company had an agent strategy in late 2024; I was inside one, building ours. The agents mostly died. The honest anatomy of a hype-wave pivot.Thu, 02 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTretroStop typing. Don't stop understanding.https://iamladi.dev/writing/stop-coding/https://iamladi.dev/writing/stop-coding/The keyboard depreciates, not the thinking. Stop typing code, direct the loop in English, and never confuse "stop typing" with "stop understanding."Wed, 01 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTessayUI isn't dying. It's splitting in two.https://iamladi.dev/writing/ui-is-dying/https://iamladi.dev/writing/ui-is-dying/The task interface gets generated and thrown away; the trust interface is what's worth owning. Confuse the two and you build on the wrong half.Wed, 01 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTessay18 years, four bets, one patternhttps://iamladi.dev/writing/four-bets-one-pattern/https://iamladi.dev/writing/four-bets-one-pattern/Rails, React Native, Web3, agents. What catching a wave early actually costs, and why I keep doing it anyway.Thu, 14 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTfield noteThe graveyard is the portfoliohttps://iamladi.dev/writing/graveyard-is-the-portfolio/https://iamladi.dev/writing/graveyard-is-the-portfolio/On shelving most of what you build, and why the dead projects taught me more than the shipped ones.Thu, 30 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTlogBuilding the plumbing, not the interfacehttps://iamladi.dev/writing/building-the-plumbing/https://iamladi.dev/writing/building-the-plumbing/Memory, sandboxes, reasoning, routing. Why the least glamorous layer is the one worth owning right now.Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTessaySmall models, big reasoninghttps://iamladi.dev/writing/small-models-big-reasoning/https://iamladi.dev/writing/small-models-big-reasoning/16 research-backed reasoning strategies and a router that picks one per task. Notes from teaching small local models to think.Wed, 18 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTfield noteI shipped a game, then walked awayhttps://iamladi.dev/writing/shipping-a-game/https://iamladi.dev/writing/shipping-a-game/Five years, a small studio, a narrative game on Steam. What building Book of Aaru taught me that no SaaS ever did, and why I closed the studio anyway.Thu, 22 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTretro