rigami.
/// Insights

Notes from
the shipping floor.

Plain-language writing on mobile, AI, real-money gaming, auctions and culture-forward product engineering — by the people who ship.

2026-02-10
Mobile

Why mobile-first is still the right call in 2026

The web got fast again and AI got useful, but the first tap of the day still happens on a phone. Here's how we think about mobile-first for culture-forward brands.

6 min read
2026-02-02
AI

Shipping LLM features without shipping a demo

Most LLM features look great in a demo and fall apart in production. Here's the observability, eval and rollback stack we wrap around every AI feature.

9 min read
2026-01-20
Gaming

Class II vs Class III: what operators actually need

A plain-language walk-through of Class II bingo mechanics and Class III RNG — and the engineering surface that each one demands.

11 min read
2026-01-08
Commerce

Auctions are a design problem before they're an engineering one

What we learned building HipHopGrails — why bid mechanics, anti-snipe and event run-of-show are UX concerns first, systems concerns second.

7 min read
2026-02-18
Auctions

Why .NET + Azure is still the right call for high-value auctions

Node and Postgres get the blog posts. For high-value auction platforms, the boring stack is still winning — and here's why we doubled down on .NET and Azure for HipHopGrails.

8 min read
2026-02-14
Operating

The case for senior-only delivery — what 7 years and 40 engineers taught us

Most agencies sell juniors at senior rates. We sell seniors at senior rates and ship in a quarter what pyramid agencies ship in a year. Here's why the model works.

7 min read
2026-02-08
Mobile

How we evaluated React Native vs native after 9 mobile builds

We've shipped 9 production mobile apps in the last 4 years — some React Native, some fully native. Here's the decision framework we now use, with the trade-offs that actually matter.

10 min read