Perplexity sure knows a lot. So, too, do the folks who hang on Reddit.

Between those two sources, I have found tons of new rabbit holes. After all, how can I really know if The Now Edition will catch on if I’m unfamiliar with any of the tons of e-book creation tools that are already out there?

So I signed up for Designrr – if you have ever looked at any of these tools, it comes to you and sticks to your YouTube pre-roll ads like glue. It has many fans, but also has its critics for what Perplexity calls “aggressive upselling.”

While it feels robust, my seemingly “simple” idea of turning my Now Edition blog into a “first example” of a Now Edition e-book quickly ran into some very deep rabbit holes involving how one imports content, then can arrange it, polish it – things e-book publishers and self-publish tool outfits and users know all too well.

Designrr of course offers plenty of help and support, and is probably just what many folks need and want. But it also has limitations – it can import blog posts but not a whole blog at once. So much for creating your e-book “in five minutes” without a whole lot of prep and cleanup work.

I think I have to stop having Floot open in one tab and Base44 in the other, surely not late night, the lines blur and blecch, I can get stuck in the mud in two places at once!