TagTwists was born out of frustration. I’d built websites as a teenager, but coming back to it years later — with modern tech stacks, solo — was overwhelming. I didn’t want to build another content platform that just shoved videos and images into a feed. I wanted to do something more raw, something that gave power back to the text itself.
I leaned into Tailwind CSS, deliberately limiting myself to typography. Fonts, spacing, contrast — I pushed every aspect of text to make it feel expressive on its own. Color palettes came later. At first, I improvised. Then I studied Monet and Picasso and stole their rules. That’s where our aesthetic came from.
I held off on adding images for one reason: survival. This entire project — logic, design, animations, data — was built by one person. Every image added complexity I couldn’t yet afford. Instead, I built with ASCII, symbols, and text art. I showed early mockups to friends. Some laughed, some were confused. Most leaned in. That was enough to keep going.
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Will TagTwists eventually support images? Yes — when we can do them justice. That means better infrastructure, community moderation, and enough momentum to expand into visual storytelling and image-based games. Until then, we build with what we have: words, symbols, and you.
