See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xOnxPuBEpc
Or read it below (transcribed using AI):
Hey everyone, I am the founder of Truple and I wanted to give you a quick update on where we've been as a company and where we're going. This is going to be pretty transparent, maybe a bit more than you're used to from a company, but I think it's important that you know what's been going on behind the scenes.
A little bit of context. Truple slowed down for a few years previously. Back in 2021, I had corrective eye surgery done, think like LASIK, and I can see great now. The problem is I have chronic dry eye now in a very extreme case of it. My eyes, you might not realize this, but your eyes produce tears on a regular basis. My eyes don't do that anymore. I have to have a pocket full of these little eye drops everywhere I go, and I have to take them like every 5 to 15 minutes, depending on the environment that I'm in.
Anyway, this has made it a little bit challenging to stare at a screen all day. The good news is I've seen some significant improvements. It has been a bit slow, a little like watching grass grow at times, but it has improved, and pair that with these new AI tools and it's helping me to work more efficiently and to get honestly more code written to benefit you.
Now, I want to touch on Alfred, our new AI support chat. I have personally been handling emails for the last 9 years now. We did bring on a support agent for a little while. She had an opportunity come up that she wanted to jump on, so she took that opportunity. But even while we had her, all of the technical support emails fell on me, and I've tried bringing on these support agents to help. The problem is they struggle with the technical support stuff. The simple questions are really easy, but the complex ones require deep product knowledge, and that's where it falls on me. That's actually why we built Alfred, our AI support agent. He is built in-house, meaning we didn't just pull some product off the shelf somewhere and shove it in. We built him from the ground up and we are customizing him. I say "him"—we just gave him the name Alfred from like Batman, right? But we are improving him pretty much on a daily basis. So give him a chance. We are improving him and he is super helpful. If you have any questions or need anything, reach out to him, and if he misses the mark, just tap that little button to request an engineer and either I or Josh, who I'll talk about here shortly, will jump in and help you out.
Now, here's something that might shock you a little bit about Truple. I have been the only full-time employee for Truple since 2016. We did hire Josh as a full-time contractor last year, but aside from the iPhone app, which Josh has helped spearhead, I have written almost every single line of code for the Android app, Kindle app, Windows app, Mac app, Linux app, the Chromebook app, and the old iOS solution that just monitored the websites that you were visiting. So that's 9 years of running this company, handling everything from development to customer support to business operations to paying taxes—sales taxes every month, got to go out to a bunch of different states. Anyway, it's been a lot. Josh joining us has been life-changing because I finally have somebody who has the technical skill and knowledge to be able to help out in a significant manner.
Now I know when most people think of tech companies, they probably imagine teams of dozens of people, but the reality is most of what you see from Truple has been built and maintained by me over the last decade, little under a decade. But it has kept us lean and it's kept us focused on what really matters.
Now, having Josh as a full-time contractor has completely changed our trajectory. He's got a master's degree in cyber security. That's really important for me—we take privacy and security of your data and everything's super important. It's one of the top priorities for us. But he's also been spearheading the iPhone app development, which is great. We've had to smooth out some rough edges. We feel like the product is getting there. If you kind of grumbled with it at first, give it another chance. We are excited about this update that we have coming out in about a week or so. We're simplifying the whole setup process basically, which—I'm going down a tangent here, but we went extreme with closing up every single loophole. Here's all these instructions, but then it overwhelms you guys, at least some of you. So we're simplifying it down, and then we'll have an advanced section as well for those customers who need the advanced section.
Josh is also spearheading the AI algorithm improvements, and we're going to be incorporating those into some of the other apps here in the next couple of months as well. This is huge for us. Having Josh is huge for us because for the longest time, the company—for me, the past couple of years I felt like I was on a ship taking on water and I was just bailing buckets of water every day. Now we've got Josh in the boat with us, and pair that with these AI enhancements, and we are actually able to row this boat forward and move things forward, which is exciting for me, and hopefully exciting for you as well.
Now, I've touched on AI. AI has honestly been a game changer for me personally. If you think about my eye situation, it just helps me a lot to be in front of a computer with less eye strain essentially. But AI also gives us new tools that we can incorporate into Truple, into the product, to be able to help you all. We're really excited for what the future can bring and how these tools can help you and how we can build something that helps you. It has given me new energy, and honestly I am more excited about building than I have been in years.
So what's coming next? We've got some updates rolling out soon. You've probably already seen Alfred that I mentioned earlier—that's our AI chat. Give him a chance. He is improving every day. We are planning on releasing videos on a regular basis. Most will be focused on helping people stay safe online—that's both parents and children, but also individuals who want to overcome detrimental online habits. But I will sprinkle in some behind-the-scenes content like this video. If you do like this sort of behind-the-scenes stuff, please let us know. In fact, if you like any of our videos, please let us know. That helps us to know that it's worth continuing to invest our time into it.
I'm honestly most excited about Truple and the product enhancements that we'll be able to bring. We are making some major changes to how we operate as a company. You guys have seen glimpses of this over the past couple of months with the introduction of this app split for ScreenKin and Best Accountability. We're basically taking Truple and splitting it into two different apps. They will continue to work basically the same way. Your Truple subscription will grant you access to both of them. We will add some subtle adjustments depending on the audience for each app.
Now, I do have a request for you, if you have the capacity. If you are just burnt out, you can shut the video off now. Don't worry about it. But if you've got the capacity, I'd like to make a couple of requests. First, let us know what we could do that would help you tremendously. Just click that little chat thing, send a message to Alfred, and then click the "request an engineer." That'll go straight to us. So first, if there is something that would desperately help you, let us know what that is. One of the difficult things for people to understand, though, is there are technical limitations on what can be built in an app. We have to work within what's technically possible based on the platform, if that makes sense. That's why certain platforms have different features—it's because that platform doesn't allow certain things where another platform does. Anyway, just keep that in mind as you reach out. We'll be honest and transparent with you on the feasibility of it. We're hoping to just make sure that we are driving in the right direction essentially.
The second request that I would like to make is, if everything is working great for you, please reach out and let us know that too. It honestly does mean a lot to us. Josh and I are both engineers. We care very deeply about what we've built, and we take great pride in building things, right? It means a great deal to us to hear that something that we built has genuinely helped someone.
The third request that I would like to make is please help spread the word. In 2016, we invented this whole concept of screenshot accountability, and we brought that to the world. We've been doing the research and development that essentially has driven this industry forward. Prior to us, companies were just monitoring websites essentially. But we don't have a marketing department. We are two trained engineers who just care about building the product. So the best way that you can support what we're doing is by telling someone else about us as well—someone that you think would benefit from it. Don't just go blabbing about us to no one, right?
Thank you for being a part of this. I started something new in 2016, and because of your support, we are still here building today. Josh and I have more ideas that we believe will genuinely help people and will help you hopefully. And we're finally in a position to make them happen. So stick with us. The best stuff is ahead. And thank you again.