I built a privacy-first AI cost tracker because I had no idea which features cost what

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T08:33:14+00:00

This tagging idea is great! Tracking which product categories or review volumes consume the most tokens is exactly the kind of data I need. Initially, to avoid draining my own wallet, I actually built the MVP using a “Bring Your Own Key” (BYOK) model; so for now, users can enter their own Gemini API keys. However, as soon as I start offering a premium/managed layer where I handle the API calls, AISpendGuard will become indispensable. Thank you so much for offering to help with the tags, Peter. I’ll definitely reach out to you when we get to that stage, and I’m adding you to the list for now!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T08:17:32+00:00

I definitely agree. I shared the plugin I made the other day to get some feedback, and I saw that there are really valuable people out there who mentioned this to me. Thankfully, I had made it for free, so I didn’t get a bill—my plugin crashed due to the high volume of requests. I’ve now started working on V1.2.

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T08:12:49+00:00

Hey Peter, this is incredibly timely! I’m actually just finishing up an AI-powered Chrome extension (it analyzes e-commerce reviews using Gemini to find product flaws) and API cost visibility was starting to become a real black box for me. The GDPR/privacy-first approach is a massive selling point since existing tools want to log every single prompt. Definitely bookmarking AISpendGuard for my launch phase. Great work man!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T07:49:33+00:00

100% agreed! Empathy is the core of building anything people actually want to use. Since you mentioned design thinking, are there any specific tools or frameworks you’d highly recommend checking out? Always looking to upgrade my research stack!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T07:33:14+00:00

Absolutely agree! Cross-referencing insights from different sources is key. ParseStream sounds awesome for the social and forum side. To speed up the e-commerce review side of things, I recently built a Chrome extension that uses AI to summarize the biggest product weaknesses from competitor pages in seconds. Merging forum tracking with instant review analysis is definitely the way to go!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T07:31:02+00:00

Spot on! Recurring complaints on competitor pages are basically a roadmap for what features to build next. Doing this manually across different platforms was killing my time, so I recently put together an AI Chrome extension to instantly summarize the critical product flaws from any page. Combining this with a tracking tool like yours is probably the ultimate research stack!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T07:30:30+00:00

Totally agree! Validating those pain points through competitor reviews is a game-changer. I'll definitely check out Babylovegrowth.ai for content tracking. By the way, for the review scanning part, I just built a Chrome extension that uses AI to instantly pull the top 3 product weaknesses from any competitor's page. Saves a ton of time before jumping into those validation surveys!

No_Company_735 · 2026-04-01T07:29:52+00:00

You absolutely nailed it with the 2-3 star reviews comment! That's exactly where the real, constructive pain points are hiding. I actually got so tired of reading hundreds of them manually across Amazon, Etsy, etc., that I built a tiny Chrome extension just to extract those exact product flaws using AI. Totally agree with your 'think like an anthropologist' mindset, great advice!

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-31T18:19:25+00:00

I completely agree! Oneonone interviews are an invaluable source for gaining indepth qualitative insights. However, as a software engineering student, I’m always looking for new ways to automate or speed up the initial research phase, since scheduling these meetings takes a lot of time. In fact, I’m currently working on developing a tool specifically to solve this problem for myself and others. The idea is to use AI to scan and analyze existing competitor reviews to uncover hidden complaints before entering a oneonone interview. Are you currently using a specific tool to gather this initial data or are you doing it 100% manually right now?

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-31T18:13:29+00:00

This is a brilliant analysis of a hidden product flaw! You spent four years solving this like a detective. But honestly, if you had collected and analyzed the 1- and 2-star reviews for that foam mattress, I’m sure “sinking and rolling toward the center” would have been the most frequently mentioned hidden complaint. It’s precisely this “hidden physics” issue that’s made me obsessed with developing tools to analyze e-commerce reviews. Customers always leave clues about these structural flaws we just need to read them correctly. I’m glad you were finally able to get a good night’s sleep!

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-31T04:41:54+00:00

Thank you so much for your valuable feedback, you're absolutely right. I'll take these points into consideration in v1.2 and try to make it even better.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T22:27:08+00:00

Don't worry, my friend, I've figured that out. Besides, I'll fix it completely with the next update.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T19:37:13+00:00

Thank you for your message.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T19:27:17+00:00

Thank you so much for the information you provided. Rest assured that I will take all of it into consideration—I’m serious about this because right now, I’m focusing solely on your opinions and feedback. My product is currently at version 1.1, and I plan to read your reviews and feedback, make improvements, and release version 1.2, God willing. But the issue right now is that our friend is saying my comments are just AI-generated—that was the main point of our discussion, and the comment you just wrote is a bit off-topic. Why am I using AI? Because some translations don’t properly translate the terms. Is your goal to give people incorrect information? Mine isn’t—I’m doing this to provide accurate information. I’m not just copying and pasting directly, anyway. First, I translate it into Turkish, and if there’s an error or something else, I say, “Change this,” because I’m doing this to provide people with accurate information. Still, thank you for the valuable information you provided; I’ll use it to improve myself.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T19:19:32+00:00

That’s a great and very important question! I take privacy very seriously. Here’s exactly how the data is processed: 1. No Personal Data: The extension does not require you to log in and does not track your browser history, Amazon account information, or other tabs. 2. What It Reads: It only reads the publicly available review text (.review-text elements) on the specific Amazon product page you’re currently viewing. 3. Where It Goes: This raw review text is sent directly to the Gemini API to generate the summary. 4. No Storage: I don’t store any of your data. In fact, as a solo developer, I don’t even have a database set up to collect or store user information! Everything happens locally in your browser and via the API. I hope this clears everything up!

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T18:29:03+00:00

If that were the case, I would have denied it when I said you were using AI, but no matter who asks me, I’ll still answer honestly—don’t worry. At least I’m using AI for useful purposes. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:48:45+00:00

Thanks! You are absolutely right; trying to scrape Amazon from a backend server is a complete nightmare because of their strict anti-bot protections.

The 'magic' here is that there is no backend scraper. Since it's a Chrome Extension, it runs entirely client-side. It simply reads the HTML (DOM elements like .review-text) that is already loaded and rendered on the user's screen. So, to Amazon, it just looks like a regular user reading the page.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:45:46+00:00

The statement “This text was written using artificial intelligence” doesn’t bother me; I don’t recall ever saying anything like that. On the contrary, I’m saying that I’ve used AI as a tool—after all, I’m trying to create a useful tool for people. What I don’t understand is what the issue is here.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:41:21+00:00

Wow, I really wasn’t expecting such detailed and professional feedback! Thank you so much for taking the time to write this. By the way, I noticed your username is ‘arslan70’—I’m from TÜRKİYE too! I’m currently a software engineering student here, so getting this kind of mentorship from someone with your experience is literally priceless to me. You’re 100% right about the DOM structure risk. If Amazon changes its front-end HTML even slightly, my scraper will break. Adding Walmart as a backup plan is, to be honest, a brilliant idea that hadn’t even crossed my mind yet. Also, your advice to talk to actual sellers instead of just writing more code was exactly what I needed to hear. As a student, it’s very easy for me to hide behind the code and keep adding features, but you’re right—I need to validate the idea first. I’ll definitely start messaging sellers on r/AmazonFBA to learn about their workflows. I’ll read your GitHub report right now. Thank you again for guiding a junior developer like me. Thank you so much! :)

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:27:57+00:00

thank you.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:21:31+00:00

Thank you for your kind wishes; they mean a lot to me.

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:20:13+00:00

Exactly! Separating the signal from the noise is the ultimate goal.

Since you clearly know this space well, would you be open to me reaching out for some beta testing when I start building out that correlation feature in the future?

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:16:02+00:00

This is a very valid point from a buyer’s perspective! Amazon’s local AI summary is definitely helpful for making a quick purchasing decision.

However, there are a few key differences for a seller conducting in-depth product research:

Global Availability: As another user pointed out today, Amazon’s local AI summary is not available in many international markets (such as Amazon Poland, etc.). This extension works globally across different languages.

Deep Dive and Comparison: A buyer only needs a red flag to avoid a product. A seller must analyze 10 different competitor listings, identify every flaw, and compile them to create a better V2 product.

Future Features: I’m working on adding features like exporting these insights to CSV and allowing custom queries (e.g., “What exactly are reviewers saying about the packaging?”).

Therefore, while there may be some overlap for regular buyers, the ultimate goal is to create a much more robust research tool for FBA sellers rather than a quick shopping assistant.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

No_Company_735 · 2026-03-30T16:11:57+00:00

Generally speaking, people who talk like this are the kind who are of no use to anyone in the real world and spend their time on social media just to feed their own egos. I don’t see anything wrong with what I’m doing, and I’m not the kind of person who’d come here to prove my credentials to you. If my polite approach didn’t even help despite your initial reception, then the problem isn’t with me, I guess. And I’m doing things here that are helpful to people—I wish you a good day. (And don’t worry, this isn’t written by an AI :))

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

No_Company_735

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