I stole other people's content and got away with it

October 07, 2025

Hey there,

Most founders waste months building apps nobody wants.

I almost did the same thing.

When I first had the idea for Puff Count, I could've jumped straight into hiring developers and designers.

But I didn't.

Instead, I did something that felt completely ridiculous at the time: I locked myself in my apartment and scrolled TikTok for 7 days straight.

No building. No coding. Just pure research.

I typed "quit vaping" into TikTok, filtered by most popular videos of all time, and started taking notes.

Found a girl with 3.7 million views on a video about quitting vaping.

That's when it hit me: People were sharing transformation stories instead of app features.

She wasn't explaining how to track puffs or showing app screenshots.
She was dropping vapes into glasses of water while talking about her 7-year addiction.

I saved that video to a spreadsheet. Then another. Then another.

By day 7, I had a spreadsheet full of viral videos, broken down by hook, storyline, and call to action.

That research changed everything.

I knew exactly what worked when I started creating content because I'd studied my competition.

One of my first TikToks hit 2.6M views using that exact format. 4,000 downloads overnight.

Most founders skip this step. They build first, then pray people care.

I validated demand before writing a single line of code.

That 7-day research process is the exact system I teach others in my group.. 

Peace,
Steven