Starting Up

The resources founders actually use.

Every essay, video, podcast, book and tool behind 1,046 answered founder questions, in one place, each with a note on why it is here.

What founders use most, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

This clears up a mistake that leaks data straight out of Airtable and similar tools: putting a private key in front-end code... WeWeb Article API Key Security for No-Code Apps: Public Keys, Private Keys, and Backend Proxies WeWeb
Airtable's tokens have no row-level control: a valid token can read and write the entire base, so leaking one is a full breach.... GitGuardian Article Remediating Airtable API Key leaks GitGuardian
The safe pattern for Airtable is to keep keys and logic server-side, and this is Airtable's own feature for storing secrets... Airtable Community Article Introducing Secrets in automations: Secure your API keys and sensitive data Airtable
When you want the full picture beyond one tool, this is the friendliest serious book on application security, written for... She Hacks Purple Book · 288 pages Alice and Bob Learn Application Security Tanya Janca
A plain overview of where no-code tools tend to leak, useful because the same handful of mistakes repeats across Bubble,... CodeStringers Article Security Pitfalls in No-Code Platforms: What to Watch Out For CodeStringers
Lavingia argues for doing more with less and building only what you can sustain yourself, which fits a domain expert who wants... Penguin Random House Book · 272 pages The Minimalist Entrepreneur Sahil Lavingia
A crowdsourced look at what non-technical people are actually building for themselves with AI tools, which is useful evidence... Lenny's Newsletter Article · 12 min read What people are vibe coding (and actually using) Lenny Rachitsky
Tavel, a marketplace investor at Benchmark, argues that the first thing to solve is user happiness in a small, constrained... Sarah Tavel Essay The Hierarchy of Marketplaces Sarah Tavel
This breaks down the online directory as a business, including how they make money and roughly what they cost to start. It is... Starter Story Article Start an Online Directory: Business Idea Breakdown Starter Story
A practical guide to the directory as a lean side project, covering niche choice, getting the first listings, and monetizing... Side Hustle Nation Article How to Build a Profitable Online Directory Side Hustle Nation
This is the clearest working mental model for exactly your situation: treat the AI as a fast, over-confident pair programmer... Simon Willison's Weblog Essay · 20 min read Here's how I use LLMs to help me write code Simon Willison
Osmani is a Google engineering leader, and this book draws the exact line your question cares about: the spectrum from... O'Reilly (beyond.addy.ie) Book Beyond Vibe Coding: From Coder to AI-Era Developer Addy Osmani
Shipper taught a cohort of non-engineers to build working apps with AI and reports honestly on what clicked and where people... Every Article What I Learned Teaching 100 People To Code with AI Dan Shipper
A firsthand account of a non-engineer hitting the exact wall your short answer warns about: the tools carry you a long way,... Every Essay I Tried AI Coding Tools. Now I Want to Learn to Code. Katie Parrott
A concrete, current walkthrough of how an experienced engineer actually structures work with AI tools day to day: planning... addyosmani.com Article My LLM coding workflow going into 2026 Addy Osmani
From the author of The Phoenix Project and a veteran of Google and Amazon, this is the serious take on moving AI-assisted code... IT Revolution Book Vibe Coding: Building Production-Grade Software With GenAI, Chat, Agents, and Beyond Gene Kim and Steve Yegge
An official, plain checklist for the skill your short answer insists on: reading and testing what the AI writes before you... GitHub Docs Article Review AI-generated code GitHub
The sharpest statement of the tradeoff at the heart of your question: code you do not understand is technical debt the instant... Val Town Blog Essay Vibe code is legacy code Steve Krouse
Another non-engineer, a designer this time, showing concretely how far you can push Cursor to build interactive things without... Lenny's Newsletter Article A designer's guide to Cursor Elizabeth Lin
A research study, not a hot take, on the real tradeoff between the speed of vibe coding and the technical debt it piles up. If... arXiv Article Vibe Coding in Practice: Flow, Technical Debt, and Guidelines for Sustainable Use arXiv
This is the clearest short read on the exact idea behind your answer: pick one place everyone agrees is real, and let the rest... Notion Essay · 8 min read Here's why your startup needs a single source of truth Notion
Automation stops being mysterious once you see it as one sentence: when this happens, do that. This official page defines a... Zapier Help Article · 5 min read What is a Zap? Zapier
This is the discipline your answer opens with: draw the flow before you connect a single app. It makes the case that automating... McCary Group Article · 7 min read Map your business process before automating it McCary Group
Once Airtable is your source of truth, this gives you concrete, copyable patterns for syncing it outward to email, Slack,... Zapier Article · 10 min read 9 Airtable automation ideas Zapier

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Playbooks

A goal, and the route through it a step at a time.

Find an idea worth pursuing Spot problems worth solving and find the one that actually fits you. 4 steps Validate before you build Get real evidence people want it before you write a line of code. 4 steps Understand your customers Talk to real users, define who you're for, and read the market clearly. 4 steps From idea to first customers The idea-stage spine: find a problem, prove it, talk to customers, and land the first ten. 4 steps Build an MVP without code Ship a first version with no-code tools before you hire anyone. 4 steps Build and launch your first product Turn a validated idea into something real people can use. 6 steps Find and work with developers Hire, brief, and work with builders without getting burned. 4 steps Name and brand your startup Name it, design an identity, and say what it does in a line. 3 steps Build a landing page that converts A page that loads fast, earns trust, and turns visitors into signups. 4 steps Get your first customers The scrappy, unscalable work of going from zero to your first paying users. 5 steps Sell it yourself, founder-led Reach out, run the conversation, and close before you have a sales team. 4 steps Grow with content and SEO Compound reach with content, search, and a founder audience. 3 steps Grow with paid ads Spend that returns: the channels, metrics, and loops behind it. 4 steps Price and package your product Charge for value, package it right, and check the numbers work. 3 steps Bootstrap instead of raising Fund growth from revenue, and keep control of your company. 4 steps Raise your first round Understand the game before you pitch: whether to raise, from whom, and on what terms. 5 steps Find a co-founder, split equity Find the right partner and split equity without regret. 3 steps Set up the company right Incorporate, split equity, protect your IP, and make your first hires. 4 steps Survive founder life Mindset, burnout, the leap, and the parts nobody warns you about. 5 steps Build in India The India-specific playbook: schemes, government, enterprise, and the local market. 5 steps

The questions founders start with

I want to start a startup but I don't have an idea. Where do I even begin? Stop hunting for a billion-dollar idea and start collecting problems. The best ideas come from noticing things that annoy you or people around you ... Beginner 19 resources → What does 'validating an idea' actually mean? Validation is gathering real-world evidence that a specific group of people has a painful problem AND will change their behaviour (pay, sign up, sw... Beginner 20 resources → Do I actually need a co-founder, or can I go solo? You don't strictly need one, but the data says teams outlast solos: complementary skills, shared load, and someone to argue you out of bad calls al... Beginner 3 resources → What actually counts as an MVP, and what's the smallest one I can get away with? An MVP is the least you can build (or fake) to test your single riskiest assumption, not a shrunken version of your dream product. Ask 'what's the ... Beginner 20 resources → How do I talk to customers without them just telling me what I want to hear? Stop pitching and start interrogating their past. Ask about what they actually did last time the problem hit, what it cost them, and what they trie... Beginner 23 resources → How do I actually get my first 10 customers when nobody has heard of me? You go get them by hand, one at a time, email people you already know, people your investors/friends know, and strangers in the exact niche you're ... Beginner 19 resources → How do I decide how much to charge for my product? Stop guessing and stop pricing off your costs, price off the value the customer gets and their willingness to pay. Talk to customers about pricing,... Beginner 3 resources → Should I raise venture capital or bootstrap my startup? Raise VC only if your business needs a big pile of cash to reach escape velocity before someone else does, and if a 10x-in-a-few-years outcome is g... Beginner 3 resources →

Questions for your situation

The Aspiring Founder The Idea-Stage Founder The Builder The Launcher The Grower The Student Founder The Indie Hacker The Technical Solo Founder The Non-Technical Founder The Domain Expert The Women Founder The Anywhere Founder The Corporate Switcher The Repeat Founder

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