I'm Armand, a professional developer based in Lyon, France. Like many of you reading this, I've used just about every productivity app out there — mainly Notion and Obsidian, Google Docs, and I even tried Scrivener at one point, though I never really got the hang of it.
These tools accompanied me as a student, as a teacher, and as a developer. They do a great job, but they always felt either too generic or a little like giant spreadsheets. First and foremost, my aim with Scriptorium is to make connections between notes and ideas, all in one place. I wanted a mix of flexibility and ease of use, but also a feature-complete app — without downloading plugins or having features locked behind subscriptions.
For the past few years, the developer world has had access to tools that make it possible to build powerful apps that run on any computer.Scriptoriumis my opportunity to offer my own vision of a writing and world-building app.
AI is a tool, not a subscription
It also gave me the opportunity to test local AI models. Used the way they are meant to be used, most computers can run them. Right now, text-to-speech lets you listen to your work with good, lifelike voices, for free. And if you'd rather speak than type, a speech-to-text model will write down anything you say. That's great for different kinds of users, and great for accessibility too.
I see AI as a tool. I also think AI pricing models are a bit nebulous — things like raising the price of your subscription just so you're allowed to plug in an API key. It means you pay for the app, and then you pay an external provider on top of it to actually use the AI. That isn't user-friendly, and it would have been the wrong road to take with Scriptorium.
So why isn't it free?
I simply want to maintain this project over the long term, and I strongly believe the app has even more potential than it shows today. There are real costs attached to a project like this, and a free app would hold its development back.
What I can promise you is that I will never put a subscription on it. I think most of us are tired and sick of subscriptions — and for whatScriptorium is, I'm fairly confident that some of you won't mind it simply staying on your computer.
This app evolves with you. Contact me at [email protected], or use the feedback feature, and I'll make sure to answer.
Armand