The Problem with Modern SaaS
I'll use Calendly as an example because that's where this started.
I already pay Google for a calendar. So if I'm going to pay a second company for calendaring, they need to solve calendaring. Not move it a bit further downfield. Solve it. Unified view across all my calendars. Smart reminders. Blocked-off time. No booking on holidays. Conflict detection across personal, work, and family calendars. The whole thing. If you're not going to just solve it, get out of the way.
Calendly is trying. Scheduling links, availability, team routing, CRM integrations. They're genuinely attempting to be the "solve all things calendaring" company. But at $20/month, they couldn't connect to all my calendars. I had conflicts. One job — unified calendaring — and they couldn't do it right for my setup. A calendaring tool that doesn't have a calendar view. You can't make that up.
If you're not going to just solve it for a reasonable price, get out of the way. I was paying $20/month for their "Professional" plan. They quietly restructured pricing, replaced it with a $12/month "Standard" plan with nearly the same features, and kept charging me $20 on the legacy plan. The one feature I'd lose by downgrading? Routing forms — a sales team feature I never used. I was overpaying by $8/month and had no idea, because who audits 15 different SaaS subscriptions every month?
You came to them with one problem — "let people book time with me" — and now you have three: the calendar still doesn't work right, you're overpaying, and you're too busy to deal with either. Instead of solving calendaring, they've given you a recurring mental load problem around calendaring. Legacy plans, quiet price increases, features gated behind tiers you don't need.
And then there's lock-in. Try leaving. Export your Calendly booking history — your scheduling patterns, your meeting notes, your integrations. They make it easy to get in and hard to get out. That's not a partnership — that's a trap.
It Costs Too Much
If Calendly charged $4/month, I never would have built this. A booking page is worth maybe $3/month plus a reasonable margin. Fine. But they were charging me $20. They quietly restructure pricing, grandfather legacy plans, and count on you not auditing. If you're not going to solve it for a reasonable price, get out of the way.
It Doesn't Actually Solve It
I already pay Google for a calendar. If I'm paying a second company for calendaring, they need to actually solve it — unified calendars, reminders, holiday blocking, conflict detection. Calendly couldn't connect to all my calendars. A calendaring tool without a calendar view. If you're not going to just solve it, get out of the way.
Privacy Is a Marketing Word
"We take your privacy seriously" is on every website and means nothing. So instead of saying it, we show you exactly what the server can and cannot read. Your vault passwords? Zero-knowledge — we can't read them. Your calendar? We can — and we'll tell you that. Delete means DELETE. Export means everything. Transparency over trust.
The Economics Have Shifted
Building good software is much easier than it used to be. It used to require a whole team of A-players to have a chance of getting it right. AI changed that. Teams can be smaller now. More opinionated. The companies behind the software can be smaller and less dependent on growth. One engineer with AI can build what used to take many — and you own it forever. No subscription fees. That's why the economics shifted.