So where are all the AI apps? – Answer.AI

Practical AI R&D

Answer.AI
It is incredibly easy now to get an idea to the prototype stage, but making it production-ready still needs boring old software engineering skills. I know countless people who followed the "I'll vibe code my own business" trend, and a few of them did get pretty far, but ultimately not a single one actually launched. Anyone who has been doing this professionally will tell you that the "last step" is what takes the majority of time and effort.

Exactly, there have been loads of tools over time to make software development easier - like Dreamweaver and Frontpage to build websites without coding, or low/no-code platforms to click and drag software together, or all frameworks ever, or libraries that solve issues that often take time - and I'm sure they've had a cumulative effect in developer productivity and / or software quality.

But there's not one tool there that triggered a major boost in output or number of apps / libraries / products created - unless I missed something.

Sure, total output has increased, especially since the early 2010's thanks to both Github becoming the social network of software development, and (arguably) Node / JS becoming one of the most popular languages/runtimes out there attracting a lot of developers to publish a lot of tools. But that's not down to productivity or output boosting developments.