I cloned a VC startup in just 4 hours using ChatGPT
Have you ever stumbled across an amazing app or service, only to find out that it’s about to be shut down? That’s exactly what happened to me with Toucan, a popular language-learning browser extension.
Toucan, www.jointoucan.com, was a browser extension that would help you learn a new langauge just by slowly incorporating words from the new language into your existing daily reading. Essentially you absorb a new language the same way you learned all the words you know in English.
This is exactly the method that I have been promoting in language learning for years. I learned most of what I know in English by reading novel after novel in middle school. Far more than anything I ever learned in class or by “studying”. So this app sounded perfect for me.
But here’s how I heard about Toucan. I follow a bunch of VCs, tech bloggers, programmers, and investors on Twitter, and one of them retweeted a message from Toucan’s founder that said it was shutting down.
I had never heard of Toucan before, but being a fan of birds I really wanted to know what Toucan did. (Seriously, I love birds. They’re totally real.)
I found out it was a browser extension that replaced words with words in a different language: exactly what I wanted!
I was dissapointed to hear about it only as it was winding down, and I knew that I had to do something to keep the service alive.
But where do you turn when your favorite app is shutting down? That’s where ChatGPT came in. With the help of this amazing AI language model, I was able to create a brand new browser extension that does the same thing as Toucan: Word Sponge.
First thing I did was load up GPT-4. I wanted fewer errors, and GPT4 has been correct about 25% more often than GPT-3.5, so I wanted to start with the best I had access to.
I started with this prompt:
Let’s build a chrome extension. First, one time, it should receive a list of words & translations, like cat:gato from https://analso.com/sponge/words. Then on every webpage it should replace those words when they are found on the page with the translated words. They should make it when you click the translated word, it changes back to the original word.
I had never built a chrome extension before. But I am a senior dev, so I thought it can’t be that hard. And boy, it was beyond not hard. It was the easiest thing I’ve ever built.
We created a folder with 4 files: background.js, content.js, manifest.js, and style.css and GPT told me exactly what to put in each.
I iterated with it a bit. I changed the domain name to something more fun, asked it to automatically download and update the word list once per day, and I built the skeleton of the backend.
Creating Word Sponge was easy and fun, thanks to the guidance and suggestions of ChatGPT. I had never created a Chrome extension before, but with ChatGPT’s help, I was able to navigate the process with ease.
Now it’s not 100% complete, I’ve run into a few strange bugs. For some reason the first version of the extension causes errors on both Google and Twitter. So I had to disable it on those sites in the code so I can figure out why. I also have yet to implement user tracking for words, but I have a plan for that that will involve using GPT to generate word lists of varying progressions, and leveling up users over time. These kinds of things you will still need real developers for. The AI hasn’t yet been able to figure out why it’s causing the issues on Twitter and Google, so I am going to have to do that myself.
Using the power of ChatGPT, I was able to create a browser extension that replaces words on web pages with their translations, helping language learners to improve their skills while browsing the web. With Word Sponge, users will be able choose the language they want to learn, and the extension will automatically replace words on the page with their translations.
And Word Sponge is designed to be unobtrusive, only replacing words in regular text, not in attributes such as classes or data tags. It also avoids replacing words inside <a> tags or <input> tags, ensuring that your browsing experience remains smooth and seamless.
But the best part of creating Word Sponge was the sense of accomplishment and satisfaction I felt when I saw it in action. Thanks to ChatGPT, I was able to create something new and exciting, and help people continue their language-learning journey even after Toucan shuts down.
If you’re facing a similar situation with your favorite app or service, don’t despair. With the help of ChatGPT, you can create something new and amazing, and keep the spirit of your favorite app alive. Another neat alternative is to imagine how many services out there are just wrappers and marketing around very simple code. With the ability of ChatGPT to code for you, cloning almost any service is within your grasp. Imagine no longer subscribing $9 per month to 8 different services, when you can just create your own in a few hours.
Thankfully, we will still need real developers for a while. ChatGPT can’t yet figure out why the extension does funny things on Google search and Twitter, so I’m going to have to manually debug this. There will still be a huge demand for developers who know how to debug weird errors, so we can all breathe easy for at least a little while longer.
I want to give a shoutout to the people who created Toucan: they are probably some really great developers and you should hire them. But we are facing a reality today where AI really will be replacing several jobs and shifting what we do day-to-day as developers. I am wishing everyone that was on the Toucan team the best.
Here’s a picture of a Toucan to brigthen up your day.
