Flash's messy creativity shows why AI can't replace genuine invention
Genuine Creativity Is Your New Moat (2026)
The Flash era proved that giving people a weird new tool unleashes a wave of experimentation—and that experimentation, not features or price, is the real competitive moat. Today, with AI generating 35% of new websites and making competent execution abundant, the author argues that only a habit of radical reinvention—questioning every assumption and iterating fast—can keep you ahead of copycats.
Your moat is the ability to keep inventing original solutions to problems while everyone else is just iterating on the same tired answer.
- lordnacho
That's not a moat, that's a red queen?
A moat allows the owner a degree of passivity. Eg, you own the desktop OS. You are already using this moat to get office software on every machine, while competitors either have to dance to your tune when publishing a program, or think of a way to get their own OS out there. You can see how the internet develops, knowing that you can get your own browser on every machine for free. You can watch for a bit before you move.
Relying on continuous inspiration is a treadmill that goes faster and faster. That's what's described here. Come up with something new and clever, someone copies it, come up with another thing. You can't be passive, you have to be moving constantly.
- Animats
> The Present Works and is Boring
"Genuine creativity" for mundane web sites is a reason to close the page and buy from someone else. I'm tired of the overcomplication. The page jerking around as more crap is loaded. One minute page loads on mobile (looking at you, CNN).
All that has negative value if you just want to buy the thing. I just got done with an "instant quote" site that took 12 hours to respond for a request for a mattress install.
- zcw100
Maybe everyone has it backwards. They shouldn't be mad at everyone pumping out AI shit. They should be mad at all the crappy stuff we were forced to endure that was no better than AI shit. The only difference is the crap doesn't cost anything anymore.
The emperor has no clothes.
- jonplackett
I really miss that flash let non-programmers or ‘lite’ programmers (which I was at the time) make cool shit.
I still don’t think a tool has really replaced it as a visual coding tool.
- cat-whisperer
Agreed. People should experiment and let their creativity run rampant.
What stands between them and that is the current crop of AI design tools and skills. lovable, emergent, frontend-design, Impeccable. They ship someone else's taste and hand you a 95% website. Good website, not your website.
These tools are nozzles. They shape the flow before it leaves your hand. If you want creativity unchecked, use the raw tool.