Ryo Lu went from Notion's founding designer to cloning himself with AI at Cursor. This is the full conversation.From building anime fansites at 11 to architecting Notion's core systems to creating his own OS in a browser - Ryo reveals why the best designers are actually tool makers in disguise. We dig into creative burnout, why he stopped asking permission, and how AI is turning designers into parallel processors of their own brains.Get the UX Tools Newsletter (written by me)Join 100,000+ designers for weekly insights on creative software and the people shaping it: https://uxtools.coCHAPTERS:00:00 - Building websites at 11 years old02:00 - The Chinese Apple fanboy community03:50 - Failed startups and depression07:00 - Creating "Chinese Stripe" in Shanghai09:00 - How payment friction created China's internet boom11:00 - Ivan's daily 4:30pm design critiques at Notion14:00 - "I was not wrong either" - handling creative friction17:00 - Becoming a sponge for information20:00 - The fog of war problem in design24:00 - "There is one ultimate solution"27:00 - Why all SaaS tools are the same underneath30:00 - From Figma to code - killing the abstraction layer35:00 - Building prototyping environments38:00 - Why Notion and Cursor solve the same problem42:00 - What is RyoOS really?45:00 - "Constant flow state" - rediscovering creative joy48:00 - Designer burnout and serving too many masters50:00 - 16-year-olds will out-build senior engineers52:00 - "We're just builders and makers"ABOUT TOMMY GEOCOI spent 15+ years in tech and design. Former military. Father of five. Now building Internet Enjoyers, a weird little media + product studio rediscovering soul in creative tech. This show is how I'm rediscovering my love for the game.ABOUT STATE OF PLAYHost Tommy Geoco discovers what fuels the internet's most interesting designers and builders.SPECIAL THANKS:Sam Chapman: https://x.com/editedbysamMapal Berenson: https://youtube.com/@mapalBernabe Bolanos: https://youtube.com/@bernabebolanosAdam Stewart: https://youtube.com/adnastuTom Fox: https://catalog.tomfox.site/LINKS:UX Tools: https://uxtools.coFollow Ryo: https://x.com/ryolu_Try Cursor: https://cursor.comSee RyoOS: http://os.ryo.lu/FOLLOW ME:Instagram: https://instagram.com/itsdesignertomX / Twitter: https://x.com/designertom_LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/tommygeocoTikTok: https://tiktok.com/@designertomThreads: https://threads.net/itsdesignertom

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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