Vibe Coding: From Commodore 64 to AI-Native Startups

When I was ten years old, I sat in front of a glowing blue screen, typing commands into my Commodore 64. Most of the time I used it for games, but those early hours of tinkering planted the seed: computers weren’t just machines — they were creative companions.

As my career unfolded, that relationship with technology kept evolving. In finance and controlling, Windows, Excel, and databases became my daily tools. When the first wave of the internet — Web 1.0 — arrived with Google, Amazon, and e-commerce, it felt like the world was opening up. Then the dotcom crash came, and many of those dreams went up in smoke. Out of the ashes rose new services like YouTube, showing the web’s capacity to reinvent itself.

Web 2.0: From Reading to Co-Creating and Social

The second wave — Web 2.0 — was fundamentally different. The early web was about reading: static websites, portals, and one-way publishing. Web 2.0 transformed the internet into a place for interaction and co-creation.

Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn created digital spaces where users didn’t just consume content — they generated it. Wikipedia became the poster child for collective knowledge creation. Suddenly, the user wasn’t just a reader, but also an author, a curator, a participant.

This was the birth of the social web. Sharing, connecting, liking, and commenting became core behaviors. The web turned into a network of conversations rather than static pages. Communities formed around shared interests, and platforms scaled on the back of this engagement.

For businesses and creators, this meant one thing: distribution and discovery now flowed through social graphs. If you weren’t part of the conversation, you were invisible.

Mobile First: The Gig Economy in Your Pocket

While Web 2.0 was transforming how we interacted online, another revolution was happening in our hands. The iPhone and Android brought the principle of Mobile First: services designed not for the desktop, but for the phone.

This wasn’t just a smaller screen — it was a new context. Phones had GPS, cameras, and constant connectivity. Apps weren’t just websites ported to mobile; they were entirely new experiences.

Airbnb and Uber weren’t simply Web 2.0 platforms — they were the fusion of mobile technology with the gig economy. They connected people in real time, using location and instant payments to create new business models. Mobile First made platforms truly global and personal, compressing supply and demand into the palm of your hand.

If Web 2.0 was about interaction, community, and social co-creation, Mobile First was about immediacy and participation in the physical world. Together, they defined how the 2010s were built.

Discovering AI as a Creative Partner

Fast forward to 2022: I encountered language models for the first time. By 2023, I was using ChatGPT to write crypto-related code. What surprised me most wasn’t just that it could generate code — it was how useful the interaction was. Coding no longer felt like a solitary act of writing syntax; it became a dialogue, a back-and-forth with a partner that understood context.

That experience changed everything.

I moved on to Cursor, a tool created by four founders who reimagined Visual Studio Code with large language model chat built in. Suddenly, the editor wasn’t static — it was alive. I could sketch ideas, test approaches, and debug with an assistant that felt embedded in my workflow.

Then came the next leap: Anthropic’s code agents, fully integrated with GitHub. This was more agentic, more proactive. Instead of writing every line myself, I began orchestrating tasks. The AI scaffolded features, handled boilerplate, and suggested architecture. My role shifted from pure coding to something broader: part developer, part product manager, part designer.

That’s the essence of what I call Vibe Coding.

Vibe Coding: Working in Flow with AI

Vibe Coding is not about replacing developers or mindlessly generating code. It’s about working at a higher level of abstraction — describing intent, guiding direction, and letting AI handle the heavy lifting.

It feels less like coding in the traditional sense, and more like jamming with a creative partner. You follow the rhythm, improvise on ideas, and let the flow carry the work forward.

The outcome isn’t just speed. It’s scope. Tasks that once required entire teams can now be tackled by a single person. Instead of spending all my energy on syntax or debugging, I can focus on the bigger questions:

What problem am I solving for the user?
How should the product feel in their hands?
What workflow delivers the most value?

The code becomes a medium to express those decisions — not the bottleneck.

From Builder to Product Creator

This shift has been transformative. My role is no longer defined by lines of code written, but by the product created. With AI agents as copilots, I can fluidly move between engineering, design, and product management.

That’s how Protime was born. By leaning into Vibe Coding, I could build a system that transforms chaotic inputs — emails, newsletters, feeds — into actionable clarity. Protime is not just another productivity app; it’s an AI-native product that shows what happens when you work in flow with machines that collaborate, not just compute.

Why It Matters

Every technological wave has expanded who gets to build. Web 1.0 made information accessible. Web 2.0 made participation and social discovery possible. Mobile First made everything instant and personal. Now, AI is redefining creation itself.

Speed → Ideas can be tested and iterated in days, not months.
Leverage → One founder can cover engineering, product, and design.
Focus → Instead of drowning in technical detail, you can concentrate on user value.

For startups, this means fewer excuses and more experiments. For enterprises, it means rethinking what “developer productivity” even means. For individuals, it means anyone with vision and persistence can build something impactful.

The Next Chapter: AI-Native Startups

From my first Commodore 64 to Protime, the arc is clear: technology has always been a companion. Today, it’s finally becoming a collaborator.

With Vibe Coding, I can now create a complete product by myself — one that is genuinely useful for many users. The age of the solo entrepreneur is here. We will see countless new products emerge, built faster and smarter by individuals and small teams working in flow with AI.

Protime is my contribution: an AI-native startup where agentic workflows are the default. Users don’t just query data — they instruct agents to act on their behalf. This means shifting from “summarize emails” to triage, prioritize, draft replies, schedule, and remind.

In other words, your digital secretary — practical, reliable, and useful not just for tech experts but for SMEs, solopreneurs, and everyday professionals.

And this is only the beginning. Stay tuned for our next features this autumn.