PF Paul Ford Paul Ford Writer and co-founder of Aboard, who has published essays and stories on Ftrain.com since 1997 and writes about software, AI and vibe coding.

“I say, hey, Claude, I know you know about all the other candle stores. Do me a favor, veer off a little bit, take a swing. And it is like your uncle at karaoke. It is not good.”

The Aboard Podcast · AI Builders · August 2026

“I say, hey, Claude, I know you know about all the other candle stores. Do me a favor, veer off a little bit, take a swing. And it is like your uncle at karaoke. It is not good.” — Paul Ford, The Aboard Podcast

Paul Ford and Rich Ziade use a vibe-coded candle store as their example of why products built with AI tools look alike. Rich has just said the model has digested every candle store in the world. Paul describes what happens when he asks it for something original anyway.

Transcript

The Aboard Podcast Around 18:34 into the episode
Paul Ford

A little bit. And even the serendipity. Explain to the audience why it makes candle stores that look a lot like other candle stores.

Rich Ziade

It has metabolized all the candle stores in the world. Great explanation. It has eaten them all up and it's digested them. And now it is ready to poop out a candle store at any time.

Paul Ford

And I've tried it. I say, hey, Claude, I know you know about all the other candle stores. Do me a favor, veer off a little bit, take a swing. And it is like your uncle at karaoke. It is not good. Even when you ask it to take a swing,

Rich Ziade

there's a way to work with this stuff where you can say, okay, we're going to start with the baseline of candle store. But I wanted to do, I want people to be able to come in and literally describe their moods by picking, you know, colors and or tell me how old they are. Yeah. And then I will have it do. Like, I could come up with a whole product and experience around your candle store.

Paul Ford

Yes.

Rich Ziade

At that point, and I've been doing this, I've been doing stuff like this. Yep. It is absolutely indistinguishable from classic product work and development. It's not.

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