Direct answer: this week Google launched Antigravity, a free tool where AI agents write software almost on their own (Google). It is for developers, so you will probably never open it. But what it means lands squarely on you: building a custom tool just got much cheaper and faster, so "a system of my own is too expensive for a practice my size" stopped being true. Here is what changes for you, and the 5 questions to ask before you let anyone build you something, so it becomes a system and not another loose island.
What happened, in plain terms
Google released Antigravity, a platform where AI agents plan, write, and test software with very little human help (Google). It is free and built for developers, not for business owners. It is not a "describe your app and you are done" tool for you.
So why should you care? Because when the most expensive, slowest part of making software (writing the code) suddenly gets cheap, the price of having a tool built to your exact needs drops with it. What used to take months and a big-company budget now takes a fraction of the time. The barrier that stopped you is falling.
What changes for your practice
For years, the answer to "I want a panel to see my patients, or a tracker for my cases" was "that costs a fortune, just use a spreadsheet." That answer is expiring.
The question is no longer "can I afford to have a tool built?". More and more, you can. The new question, the one that actually matters, is different: "what will it connect to, and who maintains it when something changes?". Because a cheap tool that does not talk to your CRM, your calendar, and your billing does not save you chaos, it adds one more island someone has to watch.
The trap: a tool is not a system
Here is what almost nobody will tell you while everyone celebrates how cheap building has become. The cost of building went to zero. Good. That was never your real bottleneck. Your bottleneck is connection.
If tomorrow someone builds you a beautiful patient panel that lives apart from everything else, you just created a fourth thing to check, and nobody will check it. That is how a house of cards gets built: one tool per problem, stacked, with no system underneath. The future is not more apps. It is fewer disconnected tools.
The 5 questions before you build (or commission) a tool with AI
Save this for the next time someone offers to "build it for you super fast with AI":
- What does it connect to? If it does not talk to your CRM, your calendar, and your billing, it is an island.
- Who finds out if it breaks? Every tool breaks on some Tuesday. It has to alert someone.
- Who maintains it when something changes? Cheap to build is not cheap to keep.
- Does it replace something or just add one more screen? If it does not retire an old tool, check whether you really need it.
- Does it solve a process that already works, or automate the chaos? If the process is not clear, organize it first. We cover it in automating a broken process does not fix it, it speeds it up.
If all five have good answers, go ahead. If not, you just saved yourself an expensive headache.
What to do this week (2 minutes)
- Think of that "tool you always wanted" (a panel, a tracker, a reminder).
- Before you ask anyone to build it, answer the 5 questions above for yourself.
- Start with number 1: write down what it would have to connect to in order to actually help you.
Keep reading
- Automating a broken process does not fix it, it speeds it up - why process first, then tool (Hub365).
- AI search has no page two - the other front: getting AI to recommend you (Hub365).
- Google Antigravity (official announcement) - the primary source of the news (external).
