Why renting platforms, components, and tools always costs more than it seems
Every platform dependency is a bet, but most creators don’t realize how expensive that liability becomes until it’s too late.
The recent TikTok acquisition is just the latest reminder.
I’ve felt this from every side: business owner, creator, design systems lead.
All of them taught me: dependencies are deferred costs disguised as convenience. Any ease-of-use or reach you gain from a platform, frontend library, or design tool is often outweighed by opaque seller fees, ever-increasing subscription prices, or feature-lag.
I can’t tell you the number of times a third-party component saved a sprint—then cost months in accessibility fixes, overrides, or forked maintenance. Most product designers are not aware of engineers using these third-party dependencies to meet tight deadlines. That’s why this first principle should be considered when designing anything.
Convenience Is a Short-Term Strategy
The indie web is harder on purpose, but that friction is the cost of ownership: owning your audience and your content is more appealing by the day. That’s why I’m rebuilding my site from scratch—even though it’s slower—because ownership beats convenience when you’re playing the long game. While this is, admittedly, a bigger pain in the ass than a subscription, the overall peace is worth it.
“No dependencies unless explicitly unavoidable” should be a first principle—not an afterthought. Not just for your portfolio, or design system doc site, but when coding products too. I learned this the hard way.
Dependencies are deferred costs disguised as convenience.
As a design systems lead who often has feet in both design and technical worlds, I’ve encouraged both designers and engineers to do is to hold each other accountable to this principle. If a designer asks an engineer to make a custom component, push back. A designer should have an argument as to why they are deviating from best web practices to improve the user experience. The same argument works in reverse. Not doing so causes products to be less accessible at best and a technical debt nightmare at worst.
I don’t always get this right. I still reach for shortcuts when I’m tired or rushed.
So yes, building your own tools (your own web) costs time. But renting someone else’s costs leverage.
Long-term scalability almost always favors ownership.
This is part of a broader thread I’ve been pulling on lately: ownership, independence, and designing for the long term—whether that’s portfolios, products, or platforms.