Demo-Driven Development

ELI5 — The Vibe Check

Demo-driven development is when every technical decision is made to look impressive in the next demo. Need a database? Pick the one that makes the slide deck prettier. Need error handling? Skip it — the demo path doesn't trigger errors. Need to support edge cases? The demo doesn't have edge cases. The demo always works. Production is a different story entirely.

Real Talk

Demo-driven development (DDD — not to be confused with Domain-Driven Design) is an anti-pattern where development priorities are dictated by upcoming demonstrations, stakeholder presentations, or investor meetings rather than product requirements. It produces code optimized for the happy path with fragile foundations, deferred error handling, and technical debt that compounds once the demo is over.

When You'll Hear This

"That feature was demo-driven development — it only works with the exact input from the presentation." / "We demo-driven-developed our way to a Series A and then spent 6 months rewriting everything."