Paul Ford launches TinyLittleOffice, says the web browser is enough

In a personal essay on ftrain.com, Paul Ford reports on a fun week. He launched tinylittleoffice.com, which he describes as an office suite that stores data in the URL, and found that plenty of people wanted exactly that. So many visited that the server went down; he says he had maxed out the CloudFlare free plan. After he put in his credit card, he says, a couple hundred thousand people came by to check it out. People on Hacker News insisted it was a pointless waste of time. Folks on GitHub started asking for features and fixes, all of which the team is considering and some of which it is doing. The Register wrote an article about it, and it reached the top ten of Product Hunt for a little while. Ford says the team will keep supporting and improving it bit by bit while it also does stable software development work for customers and clients.

The point of the essay is what surprised him in the process: the web browser is very powerful software for building applications, and the cost of accessing that power is going down seemingly every day. He says he put maybe twice as much effort into building a web-based office suite as he would normally put into a long newsletter post, and that anyone who wants to can learn to do it. Even after the credit card, the CloudFlare hosting cost was $0, partly because he optimizes for cheapness and partly, he says, because that is how it goes these days.

He lists browser capabilities he keeps rediscovering: the Web Crypto API as a first-class security platform, WebAssembly for native-speed code, WebGL for 2D and 3D graphics, and the Web Audio API for mixing sound. He also points to the web as a distribution platform that is inherently multilingual (he released TinyLittleOffice in 21 languages, the most common New York City ones, which is why it includes Creole and Yiddish), with a lot of accessibility infrastructure. JavaScript is a full programming language, HTML can represent most of what a document can do, and PDF.js handles PDFs in the browser. He thinks text can even be hyphenated reliably now, though he refuses to believe it. These technologies have existed for years, Ford says, but each is vast, and they were built for large teams like those at Google rather than for individuals. For more than a decade, he argues, the web was designed for giant companies delivering software securely to billions of people who pay by credit card, with the little guy an afterthought. Now, he says, you can make a 3D game with sound that works fine on a plane.

As a second example he points to Simon Willison's new browser 3D game Battle Drones, hosted on GitHub. Ford says Willison wrote it himself and is not a games builder. The game opens right in the browser, is multiplayer, and works offline. Ford says he can now see a path to vibe coded games like this being taken seriously; he calls it fun and good-looking, with innovative features, and says its multiplayer-over-audio feature is a first for an RTS as far as he can tell.

Ford then turns to the economy. He says the AI bubble question gets fuzzy for him: it is totally clear to him that the giant AI companies are huffing AGI paint fumes, but if 100 times as many people were making software for each other, that would blow an enormous crater into the current tech economy. He illustrates with industrial carpet looms whose owners hack the firmware to make personalized carpets. He adds that the web also destabilizes the app store economy, because the high tax of building for app stores seems less worth paying when you can test an idea from a web server for $0 after a couple weeks. He jokes that Mozilla should take another swing at a mobile phone, then tells readers to forget he mentioned it.

He closes on a mixed blessing. Having been a writer for years, he says software development feels more and more like writing, and writers are used to people not wanting to pay them. For software people, being perpetually devalued is pretty novel. Still, for clients who need software to fix a process, organize a database or get more from industrial equipment, he calls it a pretty amazing time. He is pretty confident everyone will meet in the middle, but it will take a while and look different on the other side.

Key facts

Paul Ford launched tinylittleoffice.com, an office suite that stores data in the URL; he says a couple hundred thousand people visited, and it briefly reached the top ten of Product Hunt.
He says he put maybe twice as much effort into it as into a long newsletter post, released it in 21 languages, and paid $0 for CloudFlare hosting even after adding a credit card.
His central claim: the browser is very powerful software for applications, and the cost of accessing that power is falling seemingly every day, with Web Crypto, WebAssembly, WebGL and Web Audio as examples.
He cites Simon Willison's browser 3D game Battle Drones (multiplayer, works offline) as evidence that vibe coded games may be taken seriously.
He speculates that 100 times as many people making software would upend the tech economy and that the web destabilizes the app store economy; he offers no data for either.

Why it matters

Ford's claim is that something long true has changed in price: the browser has been a capable application platform for about 20 years, but the cost of reaching that power is now dropping, so one person can ship something substantial. His evidence is his own project: a web office suite built with about twice the effort of a long newsletter post, in 21 languages, for $0 in CloudFlare hosting. He ties this to bigger questions he leaves open: what happens to the tech economy if far more people make software, and whether app stores keep their pull when a web server lets you test an idea for $0 after a couple weeks.

Who it affects

Individual developers and small teams are the main audience: Ford says the big browser technologies were built for teams like those at Google and the little guy was an afterthought, but that is changing. App store operators and developers who pay the store tax are affected by his argument that the web makes that tax seem less worth paying. He also speaks to software people generally, saying software development feels more like writing and that being perpetually devalued is pretty novel for them, while clients who need software for processes, databases or industrial equipment benefit.

How to use it

Ford's advice is that if you want to, you can learn to do this too. He names the browser pieces he found useful: the Web Crypto API, WebAssembly, WebGL, the Web Audio API, PDF.js for PDFs, and the browser's multilingual and accessibility support. He warns that each is vast, so mastering one leaves little time for the others. The project itself lives at tinylittleoffice.com, and he says GitHub users are filing feature and fix requests. He ran it on the CloudFlare free plan until traffic maxed it out, then added a credit card, with hosting still costing $0.

How solid is it

This is a first-person opinion essay, and the numbers are the author's own rough figures: 'a couple hundred thousand' visitors, 'maybe twice as much effort', 'top ten of Product Hunt' for a little while. The source does not say which AI tools, if any, were used to build TinyLittleOffice; 'vibe coded' is said only of games like Battle Drones. No data or evidence is offered for the claims about the app store economy or the AI bubble; they are the author's opinions. The 100 times figure is explicitly hypothetical.

Risks and caveats

Ford himself calls it a mixed blessing: software people may face the same devaluation writers know, and he expects a transition that will take a while and look different on the other side. He admits his office suite is weird and small, that the browser technologies are each extremely vast, and that Hacker News commenters called the project a pointless waste of time. His claim that Battle Drones' multiplayer-over-audio is a first for an RTS comes with 'as far as I can tell', and his view that vibe coded games may be taken seriously is hedged and personal. The Mozilla phone remark is a throwaway he retracts. The source gives no technical details on how data is stored in the URL, such as size limits, encoding or encryption.

“The web browser is very, very, very powerful software for applications, and the cost of accessing that power is going down seemingly every day.”

— Paul Ford, The Web Is More Than Enough