From open source hits to OpenAI (Interview)

The most valuable skill in software development today isn’t writing code—it’s designing the right abstractions, because AI has made implementation trivial. Max Wilber, once a pioneer of open source tools like Style Components and Spectrum, now leads the ChatGPT plugin directory at OpenAI, where he’s engineering a new digital frontier: intelligent, interactive apps that live inside conversations. His journey—from solving personal problems with open source, to transforming stagnant engineering teams at Shopify, to joining OpenAI for the rare chance to build something his family uses daily—reveals a radical shift in the founder’s role. No longer a coder, Max spends 90% of his time reviewing and refining high-level system architecture generated by AI agents, proving that the hardest part of building software isn’t writing lines of code, but defining the right boxes and connections. This isn’t just a tool upgrade; it’s a paradigm shift. The plugin directory now hosts hundreds of apps that render custom UIs inside ChatGPT, enabling users to search homes on Zillow, save properties, and even play podcasts—all without leaving the chat. These aren’t standalone websites but layered experiences powered by AI’s reasoning, context, and real-time interaction with external systems via MCP tool calls.