Blog

Notes from building Stax.

Why I'm shipping what I'm shipping, what the research turned up, what I'm getting wrong. One post when there's something worth saying — not on a content calendar.

My AI bill is roughly five tabs and a gut feeling. I have asked finance twice to put together a single number and both times it took two weeks and was already out of date.

— paraphrased from a CTO of a 40-person startup, r/startups
~300
posts read
7
subreddits
3
recurring complaints
Founding post · featured

Why I built Stax: 4 weeks reading Reddit, one product.

I read a few hundred posts from founders and CTOs complaining about their AI bill. The same three problems kept showing up — invisible subscriptions, unreadable UIs, and the absurdity of cost-tracking software that is itself variable-cost.

May 11, 2026 · 4 min read Read the post →
Drafting

Next up.

topics, not promises · in waitlist order
Pricing ~ jun 2026

Why flat pricing is a bet, not a marketing line.

The math behind $49 regardless of usage, what breaks if usage triples, and what I'd do before raising the floor.

Build notes ~ jun 2026

How I'm shipping the first eight providers in fourteen days each.

The provider matrix, the auth-by-auth-method trade-offs, and the one provider I'm dreading.

Research ~ jul 2026

The reddit threads that didn't make the brief.

What I cut from the founding research and why — including one complaint I almost mistook for a fourth pillar.

Security ~ jul 2026

Storing customer API keys without losing sleep.

The envelope-encryption setup, why KMS rotation is the boring part, and the one mistake I almost shipped.

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