Copilot Gets You Moving. Humans Still Make It Great.
What a six-day hackathon, GPT‑5, and an enthusiastic Copilot taught me about building fast without breaking things
I love building. I just do. I love that little sugar rush when Jupyter finally spits out the right output, or when localhost loads your API for the first time — when it finally works. Normally, I like to take my time. Sometimes, though, you do not get that luxury. Sometimes the deadline was yesterday and Copilot comes to do the job.
My hackathon project: DebateMate
A few weeks ago, I decided to put “Jane” on the shelf for a while and build something for the sheer fun of it. OpenAI had just released GPT‑5 with enhanced step‑by‑step reasoning — and a few free API credits felt like the perfect kick in the butt to join the Lablab.ai hackathon: “Co‑Creating with GPT‑5.”
Six days.
One prototype, built from scratch.
GPT‑5 promised more than just “better writing.” It promised enhanced reasoning with a new internal prompt router, longer contexts, and far better performance on multi‑step tasks — argument analysis and critique loops.
I decided to finally build a long‑time idea I never had an excuse to start before — DebateMate — an AI‑powered sparring partner for arguments and startup pitches. It’s a sandbox for your ideas, designed to embarrass you in private before you embarrass yourself in public.
The idea is simple:
Paste in a claim or pitch an idea. Anything from “My startup will change the world” to “Pineapple absolutely belongs on pizza.”
The app analyses your reasoning and flags potential fallacies and logical pitfalls.
It generates arguments and counterarguments, forcing you to see your point from the perspective of others.
Scores persuasiveness before and after objections, so you can actually measure how strong or fragile your idea really is.
And finally, it searches for supporting or contradicting sources, digging up evidence to either prove you right or tear you apart.
Does it already do all that? Of course, not! The app is six days old.
DebateMate debates me on "Pineapple pizza is delicious”
To continue reading follow the link:https://miperlabs.substack.com/p/copilot-gets-you-moving-humans-still