The Flop

Welcome back to The Flop—your cozy corner for demystifying AI with warmth, wit, and a dash of whimsy!

We’re coming to you a day early this week because of the July 4th holiday here in the States. 🇺🇸✨ 

👉 Inside today’s issue: we’ll dive into vibe coding (where writing software is as easy as baking a cake), show you step by step how I built a neighborhood event website with AI (no coding required!), and share a family movie pick that even won over three generations in my house.

🐰 Down the Rabbit Hole

What Is Vibe Coding?

Coined by computer scientist Andrej Karpathy in early 2025, vibe coding is all about collaborating with AI to make building software faster, easier, and more accessible—even if you’ve never coded before. 🤝💻

Think of it like baking a cake. 🎂

Traditional coding is what the professional baker does:
They went to pastry school. 👩‍🍳 They understand the chemistry—how sugar caramelizes, why baking powder makes the cake rise, and what happens if you swap butter for oil. They can follow (or even invent) a recipe from scratch in languages like Python, JavaScript, or C++.

Vibe coding, on the other hand, is like saying:
“Hey AI, I want a chocolate cake with raspberry filling.” 🍫✨
And the AI hands you a ready-to-go cake mix, preheats the oven, and asks if you want sprinkles on top.

You don’t have to understand every detail. You just describe what you want in plain English (or any language you like), and the AI generates the code for you.

🧁 How Vibe Coding Works

• Natural Language Prompts: You say things like “make a to-do list app with checkboxes,” and the AI writes the code.

• AI as Your Sous-Chef: Tools like GitHub Copilot, Replit, and Google Gemini Code Assist help you automate boring or repetitive tasks.

• Taste and Tweak: Like testing cake batter before baking, you try the app, see what works, and adjust as needed.

• Prototype First, Decorate Later: It’s about quickly getting a working version—polish comes after.

⚖️ Vibe Coding vs. Traditional Coding

🎂 When to Use Vibe Coding (and When to Be Careful)

🎉 Great For:

• Quick prototypes or proof-of-concept ideas

• Simple tools (like to-do lists, calculators, or personal dashboards)

• Beginners or non-coders who want to experiment and learn

⚠️ Limitations:

• Not ideal for complex, large-scale, or security-critical apps without expert review

• AI might generate code you don’t fully understand, which can introduce bugs or vulnerabilities

In short, vibe coding is like baking with a super-smart kitchen helper: you dream it up, describe it, and the AI makes it happen—even if you’ve never sifted flour in your life. 🍰✨

🧘‍♀️ What Does This Mean for You?

You don’t need to be a professional developer to make something real and useful anymore. 🎨✨

AI-powered vibe coding lets anyone bring an idea to life with words alone, just like describing your dream cake to a helpful assistant.

This week’s AI Hack of the Week shows you exactly how to try it yourself: creating your own simple website by chatting with an AI.

Even if you never plan to write a line of code yourself, it’s good to know this shift is happening. Because just like boxed cake mix changed home baking forever, vibe coding is changing who gets to “bake” software—and how easy it is to get started.

So go ahead. Dream up your recipe. 🍰💡 The AI is ready to help you make it.

🛠️AI Hack of the Week

Build a Custom Website with Lovable (No Coding Required!)

This week, I decided to see just how easy vibe coding can make building a website, so I made one for our neighborhood’s Fourth of July bash. 🇺🇸✨

I didn’t write a single line of HTML or CSS by hand. Instead, I just told the AI what I wanted, and it did the work. The result? A polished, shareable site with its own URL: 🌐 neighborhood-fireworks-bash.lovable.app

If you want to try this yourself (for your block party, club, side hustle, or family reunion), here’s how you can do it step by step:

✅ Step by Step: Make Your Own Website with Lovable

Step 1: Sign Up at Lovable

• Go to lovable.dev (you get an extra 10 free credits with this link)

• Create an account (they give you free credits to start)

• Click New Project to begin

Step 2: Describe Your Website

This is where the vibe coding magic begins. Instead of filling out complicated forms, you just tell the AI what you want.

My very first prompt was:

Lovable generated a full site with patriotic colors, event details, and sample text in seconds.

Step 3: Customize with Chat

You don’t have to touch any code. Just keep chatting!

Here are some things I asked Lovable to do:

Nix the Opening Ceremony. The parade starts at 10am. There is no Pie Eating Contest. The Fireworks start at 8:30pm. Remove the entire Activities and Entertainment section. “

 
🎨 Lovable instantly rewrote the site for me based on my instructions.

Step 4: Preview and Publish

After each edit, you can preview the updated site in real time. The site design shows up in a window on your right. Once you’re happy with your site, click Publish.

Lovable gives you a live link you can share immediately:

You can even set up a custom domain if you want to get fancy.

Step 6: Keep Updating Anytime

The best part? Even after you publish, you can keep making changes! You simply:
- Open your project in Lovable
- Describe your new update in chat (like “change the header to say ‘BBQ and Fireworks Bash’”)
- Click Publish —> Update again to instantly update your live site

No need to rebuild or start over. Just chat and tweak whenever you want.

Why I Love This Hack

✅ It was easy. The natural-language chat was so much better than clicking around in an interface.

✅ It was quick. As someone who has built websites in Wordpress and Squarespace, this was so much faster and less frustrating than fiddling with templates or page builders.

✅ It was fun. Getting a first iteration in minutes and a final product in less than half an hour made it gratifying and satisfying.

✅ It’s perfect for family projects - birthday landing pages, personal projects, yard sales. Pretty much anything my kids and I can dream up.

You’re not going to build the next Amazon this way (yet 😉), but for simple, beautiful, shareable pages? It’s a joy.

If you give it a try, let me know—I’d love to see what you make! 💌

🙂 Tiny Delights

Binkies & Zoomies

Last week we went to see F1: The Movie as a family. Three generations, ages 11 to 70 and everyone enjoyed it. 🏎️🎥

There’s a little something for everyone:

• For the moms: Brad Pitt (he’s aging like a fine red, ladies 🍷)

• For the dads: cars, racing, all the engine-revving action.

• For the kids: fast-paced entertainment, slick social media nods, and a soundtrack that feels right at home in their world.

🏎️ Family Appeal

Beyond the spectacle, there’s real heart. Themes of teamwork, mentorship, and redemption gave us lots to talk about on the ride home.

My favorite moment? When Pitt’s character brushes off social media with “It’s all noise.” Even better, by the end, the young hotshot driver comes to agree. A little wisdom for the TikTok generation. 😉

⚠️ Things to Know

That said, it is rated PG-13, and I’d agree it’s best for teens and older kids. A few notes if you're planning a family outing:

• Language: Around four dozen profanities, including a handful of strong ones. Nothing wildly shocking, but worth knowing in advance.

• Violence: Some intense racing crash scenes, including one fiery explosion. Thrilling but might be scary for younger kids.

• Sexual Content: There are a few kissing scenes, but nothing explicit.

• Runtime: At 155 minutes, it’s a long sit for younger viewers (plan that intermission bathroom break!).

🌳 Moment of Calm

AI Antidote: Where in the World?

Before we wrap, here’s a little moment of calm for your eyeballs. No AI, no productivity hack—just nature doing its thing.

Can you guess which National Park this is?

Last week’s mystery park was Yellowstone National Park, and Jake was the one who got it right! 🐻🌲 Nicely spotted, Jake - Old Faithful has nothing on your dependable park knowledge.

👋 Until Next Week

Thanks for being here. I know your inbox is a busy place, and I hope this one made you feel just a little smarter and more prepared in this new world of AI.

Warmly,
Ricci

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Last week, we explored how to use AI to answer tricky parenting questions.