Show HN: I built a site that shows every world event you lived through

by lip404 • 3 months ago

10 6 3 months ago

I was born in july of 2008 (not to get more specific), but this is what the website said:

john doe, you showed up in July 2008 just in time for the global economy to set itself on fire. While you were figuring out how to keep your head up, Lehman Brothers collapsed and the US government started handing out billions in bailouts like they were party favors. By the time you were six months old, Barack Obama was elected and someone named Satoshi mined the first Bitcoin. You didn't care; you were busy trying not to get Swine Flu in June 2009.

// Three more paragraphs

Here you are, john doe, sitting at the edge of adulthood in a world that feels like it’s being held together by duct tape and spite. You grew up watching "once-in-a-generation" events happen every other Tuesday. Now, in April 2026, with ceasefires collapsing and the map being redrawn in real-time, you're expected to have a plan. No pressure. The world you were born into is gone, and the one that replaced it doesn't offer refunds. Good luck with the rest of it, john doe.

I sort of resonate with the last lines. As someone who follows Geopolitics, the last year has anything been but hopeful.

Also the duct tape line is golden in the sense that yeah I believe that the world is just running on vibes-economy and those vibes are being the duct tape.

You grew up watching "once-in-a-generation" events happen every other Tuesday

this is something which sort of worries me. When I was studying history, I always used to imagine myself asking questions to the people who lived in that time. I am not sure if in future people are gonna be asking me the same questions. I mean, I do feel like we all should be prepared for what answer we are gonna give next generations as to all the mess-ups done. I just hope that we learn from the past and the present to build a more hopeful future.

garbagepatch• 3 months ago

Drop the AI written story, take me straight to the "Explore Your Record" view. That's more interesting.

lip4042• 3 months ago

Fair. Just added a "skip to timeline →" button visible from the first second of the loading screen. Story is the hook for some users (see Imustaskforhelp's comment below) but shouldn't be forced. You can bypass immediately now.

Finnoid• 3 months ago

Love the look and feel of the application but providing some UX feedback. On the initial page the birthdate selector confused me. It took me a while to figure out how to actually get a valid input so I get the button enabled. I think part of the confusion for me was the year chips above the selection, as I didn't realize they were quick selections.

I was trying to select the year I was born, and then click on the year chips, which I now understand reset my selection but it wasn't clear to me what it did.

Once I realized I selected the right year and left the chips alone, but the button stayed disabled. I didn't want to provide the exact birthday. But I realized I had to click on the month to get a valid input.

Just sharing this friction. The input looks nice, but might be a bit form over function here... Consider following typical conventions on how inputs like these work.

Isolated_Routes• 3 months ago

I think this is a really cool concept. Sharing thoughts on a few things that could strengthen it. After I read the report (which was really cool) and went into the "the record" section, I couldn't figure out how to get back to the report. I wanted to run this for other members of my family to share with them, but couldn't figure out how to get back to the birthday selection input field. Also, at the end of the AI generated summary, it thought it was 2024 and then later in the paragraph 2023. It was also a little tricky to navigate back and forth between windows and figure out what each one was for. Good luck with this, it has a lot of potential!

lip4042• 3 months ago

Thanks — all 3 were real bugs and they're fixed. Just shipped:

  1. "Your story" button in the header so you can always come back to the report
  2. "New report" button to enter a different birthday (for family members)
  3. The year thing — prompt wasn't giving Claude the current date, it was hallucinating 2023/2024. Now it knows it's 2026.

  The family-sharing use case is the one I completely missed. Really appreciate you calling it out.

Show HN: I built a site that shows every world event you lived through

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