Motivation
Online discourse is often chaotic, lacking structure and evidence. Inspired by the idea of fostering more meaningful and constructive conversations, my co-founder and I envisioned a platform where arguments could be built and explored logically. LucidMind was born from the desire to move beyond simple text posts and create a space where ideas are connected through a clear hierarchy of supporting and opposing points, backed by verifiable facts.
Technical Approach
As the technical lead, I was responsible for the entire development lifecycle, from conceptualization to implementation. My approach was as follows:
- Cross-Platform Application: I developed both the mobile (iOS/Android) and web applications using React Native, ensuring a consistent user experience across all devices from a single codebase.
- Graph-Based Architecture: The core of the platform was a hierarchical argument structure, which I designed and implemented. Users could create a main argument, then attach supporting or opposing arguments, forming a tree-like graph that visualized the entire debate.
- Fullstack Implementation: I used Firebase for the backend, handling user authentication, data storage (for arguments, user profiles, likes), and real-time updates.
- Semantic Argument Discovery: To enhance discoverability, I began exploring NLP embeddings and semantic search. The goal was to allow users to find related arguments and discussions based on meaning, not just keywords, laying the groundwork for features like argument recommendations as well as checks for consistency of arguments and a user's opinions across multiple arguments.
Team Dynamics
This project was a significant entrepreneurial journey. While my co-founder was the visionary who brought me into the project, our differing levels of availability (he had a full-time job and family) eventually created a bottleneck. Recognizing that the project's momentum was slowing and that it required a full-time commitment that wasn't feasible for the team, I made the difficult decision to step away. We parted on good terms, and this experience taught me invaluable lessons about co-founder alignment, the importance of shared commitment in a startup, and knowing when to make a strategic pivot. Additionally, we we onboarding another person for technical tasks and had to navigate the challenge of differing world views and expectations which was also a very valuable lesson for me.
Learnings
This project was a deep dive into building a complex, data-centric social application from the ground up. I gained significant experience in:
- Designing and implementing graph-based data structures for complex relationships.
- Practical application of NLP, embeddings, and semantic search for knowledge discovery.
- Full-stack, cross-platform development with React Native and Firebase.
- The business and interpersonal dynamics of an early-stage startup, including the critical importance of team alignment and momentum.