landing wip (#1647)

Author: ComputelessComputer

apps/web/content/articles/why-we-burned-it-down.mdx

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+---
+display_title: "Why We Burned It Down - John's POV (the chaos)"
+meta_title: "Why We Burned It Down and Rebuilt Hyprnote From Scratch"
+meta_description: "The messy truth about why we rewrote Hyprnote. No product philosophy, too many pivots, motion without progress—and how we finally got focused."
+author: "John Jeong"
+created: "2025-11-10"
+coverImage: "https://ijoptyyjrfqwaqhyxkxj.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/public_images/blog/why-we-burned-it-down/cover.png"
+---
+
+### tl;dr
+We didn't rewrite Hyprnote because it was smart strategy.
+We rewrote it because what we built before was confused.
+And the only way to fix it was to burn it down.
+
+### The Early Mess
+
+When Yujong and I started, we weren't working on Hyprnote.
+We were trying to build an AI hardware toy that talks to kids.
+But hardware was slow. Brutal. Not something two people could actually ship fast..
+
+So we pivoted to software.
+
+I'd spent a lot of time in meetings, trying AI notetakers like Clovanote.
+None of them captured nuance — the difference between "ok" and "OK!" matters when you're selling.
+I wanted something stupidly simple, clean, fast. Something I'd actually use.
+That was the spark for Hyprnote.
+
+### Shiny Tech. No Philosophy.
+
+Early on, we got distracted.
+We picked Tauri because it felt cool.
+We said "let's do local-first everything" because it sounded clever.
+Transcription, LLM, cloud, BYOK, lifetime license… everything.
+
+We had no product philosophy.
+No sharp segment.
+Just vibes.
+
+People liked it at first. Open source folks said they'd use it over Granola just because it was open source. That gave us confidence… but also made us more confused.
+
+Local-first ≠ open source.
+They're adjacent. Not the same.
+And we never picked a lane.
+
+### YC Made It Worse
+
+Then Y Combinator happened.
+And this is where we stopped thinking straight.
+
+Our group partners kept asking the right questions. Every single time.
+
+The question that we struggled the most was:
+
+> Who are your users?
+
+We said that we were focusing on enterprise — but we weren't sure.
+We were still trying to figure out who we should be selling to: banks, defense, military, or whatever.
+
+They weren't the problem. We were.
+Instead of slowing down to reflect, we tried to answer immediately.
+We mistook speed for clarity.
+
+As James from Pioneer Fund told me:
+
+> Don't mistake motion for progress.
+
+He said it's written on his son's door.
+We fell into that trap hard.
+
+We were moving fast.
+Just in 12 different directions at once.
+Vectors everywhere.
+
+### Too Much Logic. Too Much Talking. Too Little Clarity.
+
+We debated everything. Local vs cloud. Enterprise vs prosumer. Bottom-up vs top-down.
+We tried to _logic_ our way into clarity.
+You can't.
+
+Add hiring on top of that and it got worse.
+Too many opinions. Too much communication overhead.
+Alignment took forever. We moved slower, not faster.
+
+Honestly, YC was a wake-up call for me on hiring.
+I'm not hiring again for a while. Just me and Yujong now — and we're moving faster than ever.
+
+### Investors Pushed One Way. My Gut Said Another.
+
+Early angels pushed the "local-first enterprise" angle.
+"Regulated industries love data sovereignty."
+And yeah, they do. But enterprise ≠ local-first.
+They care about compliance, SOC2, consent, legal — we weren't ready for any of that.
+
+And the whole time, my gut said:
+Build for people like you.
+Busy individuals who live in meetings and want a tool that just _works_.
+
+I ignored my gut for months. That was on me.
+
+### The Product Rotted
+
+Because we never picked a path, we tried to build everything:
+
+- Local speech-to-text
+- Local LLM
+- Bring-your-own-endpoints
+- owhisper
+- Admin server
+- Hybrid setups no one fully understood
+
+It became this big, over-engineered pile of "potential" that felt bad to use.
+The codebase was tangled. The design was directionless.
+I didn't even like opening our own app anymore.
+
+### Motion Isn't Progress
+
+For months, I was obsessed with motion.
+Metrics. Launches. Growth hacks.
+But everything starts and ends with product.
+
+I've seen the hype cycles in the valley. They all crash.
+What's left after the hype is gone is the product. Nothing else.
+
+### The MVP Isn't What It Used to Be
+
+Around this time, I read something from the Linear blog that really clicked.
+
+The definition of "MVP" is different now.
+Back in the lean startup era, an MVP could be a scrappy little wedge — barely working.
+Not anymore.
+
+Users expect more.
+Products have matured.
+An MVP today still has to _feel complete_.
+It can be scrappy under the hood, but it can't be crappy in the hands.
+
+And if your wedge is _design_, like us, you don't even get that scrappy margin.
+You have to nail it.
+
+So we stopped trying to play the "ship crap fast" game.
+We're going to build something tight, sharp, and clean — and ship it with confidence.
+
+### Ferrari vs Porsche
+
+I've been thinking a lot about differentiators. Honestly? I don't have a perfect answer.
+Granola exists. They're great. They're Porsche.
+
+We want to be Ferrari.
+
+Both are sports cars. Both fast. Both in the same league.
+But Ferrari is hand-crafted, opinionated, focused on a specific segment.
+Porsche is more accessible, more mass.
+
+We're not trying to win everyone.
+We're trying to dominate a niche that _really cares_.
+
+We'll filter people through a waitlist. We'll charge from the start.
+And if people don't like that, that's fine. We're not for everyone.
+
+### Just Focus
+
+I've stopped caring about what others are building.
+Competitors matter long term, sure.
+But right now, it's us, our users, and the product.
+
+### Burn It Down. Build It Better.
+
+Fixing the old app would've taken longer than rewriting it.
+And honestly — it didn't deserve to be fixed.
+
+So we burned it down.
+We rebuilt everything from scratch.
+New app. Clean architecture. Sharper focus.
+
+This time:
+
+- We're building for people like us.
+- We're opinionated.
+- We're not mistaking speed for progress.
+- We're not shipping crap just to "look busy."
+- We're going Ferrari mode.
+
+This isn't a polished comeback story.
+It's just us finally admitting what we messed up.
+And getting back to building a product we actually believe in.
+
+
+
+<div className="not-prose my-8">
+    <p className="font-serif italic text-lg font-semibold mb-3 text-stone-700">Hyprnote</p>
+    
+    <div className="flex gap-6">
+        <div className="flex gap-2 items-center">
+            <div className="w-8 h-8 rounded-full overflow-hidden shrink-0">
+                <img
+                src="https://ijoptyyjrfqwaqhyxkxj.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/public_images/team/john.png"
+                alt="John Jeong"
+                width={32}
+                height={32}
+                className="w-full h-full object-cover border-none! my-0!"
+                />
+            </div>
+            <span className="text-sm text-stone-600">John Jeong</span>
+        </div>
+        <div className="flex gap-2 items-center">
+            <div className="w-8 h-8 rounded-full overflow-hidden shrink-0">
+                <img
+                src="https://ijoptyyjrfqwaqhyxkxj.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/public_images/team/yujong.png"
+                alt="Yujong Lee"
+                width={32}
+                height={32}
+                className="w-full h-full object-cover border-none! my-0!"
+                />
+            </div>
+            <span className="text-sm text-stone-600">Yujong Lee</span>
+        </div>
+    </div>
+</div>
+
+<img
+src="https://ijoptyyjrfqwaqhyxkxj.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/public_images/hyprnote/signature-dark.svg"
+alt="Hyprnote Signature"
+width={124}
+height={60}
+className="opacity-80 object-contain border-none!"
+/>
+
+
+<CtaCard/>