from Hacker News

Show HN: I made an app to create personalized stories for children in 5 minutes

by xcanchal on 5/20/25, 3:27 PM with 36 comments

• by sambeau on 5/20/25, 9:29 PM

  This is ghastly.

  Children’s books are some of the most wonderful little pieces of art; art that nurtures, entertains, educates and instills both moral compasses and working funny bones. All of our lives have been enriched by them. Some children’s stories continue to enrich us for all of our lives.

  This doesn’t just steal work from those artists working today, but it steals from every artist who came before. It adds nothing to humanity; it robs so much.

  It also destroys nature to do it. It robs from the world and worsens humanity.

  Why do it? Money? Infamy? Internet points?

  Please delete the project and do something worthwhile.

• by tropdrop on 5/20/25, 7:09 PM

  I am not an expert on children's stories, but I wondered about the vocabulary – "magnificent," or "newfound confidence." I'm imagining one might want to tailor the difficulty of the vocab based on the age of the child.

• by gambiting on 5/20/25, 6:06 PM

  I dislike every single thing about this. Services like Spotify and others are now absolutely flooded with AI generated kids stories, it's so hard to find anything with even an ounce of soul among all the slop.

  As a parent, I really see that as a cancer that keeps spreading among children media. I appreciate you probably thought this is a good idea for a business or a project in general but for the sake of our children and us all - please stop.

• by bookbyter on 5/21/25, 10:14 AM

  good idea! But I wonder if it is a constant and true demand for parents . I think it's a little weird to use a ai-made book, I 'd rather draw with my kid together to create a book or pictures. Only from my view, good try btw.

• by flippinbits on 5/20/25, 7:02 PM

  Interesting, I like the language selection. Checkout doesn’t work though, I wanted ti purchase one and nothing happens (500 response).

• by kemotep on 5/20/25, 5:56 PM

  So does this service have print on demand or is it just a pdf? What is the value add over just using an llm and image generator yourself?

• by tanvach on 5/21/25, 12:20 AM

  I'm sure you will get very polarized opinion here. I wish good luck to your project.

  Getting to the goal faster can be great. I've started illustrating books for my son and I can see the appeal for this tool, especially as a non-artist.

  But to me the journey to a arrive at a book (sketching, going to the library, buying books together) are the things that ultimately create memories and meaning. AI should allow you to have more time for these activities rather than removing them entirely.

• by pianetanaif on 5/20/25, 7:12 PM

  No thanks!