Simon Gelfand

Selected work

Systems, products, and operating decisions.

Built from zero, tested at scale, and carried beyond the technology.

ArticlesBase, Founder & CTO

From first production version to internet scale.

The build

I founded ArticlesBase, wrote the first production version, and led its technical direction as the bootstrapped publishing platform grew into a profitable business.

The scale

The platform ran across approximately seven production servers with a master database, two replicas, memcached, load balancing, and an in-house SEO platform.

The outcome

Years of Google algorithm changes reduced traffic and the company was sold. The experience shaped how I think about platform risk and resilience.

~1M
daily unique visitors
Top 200
Alexa rank at peak
5,000+
new articles per day
~15
people at team peak

Figures marked ~ are approximate.

Webika, Co-Founder & CTO, since 2008

A studio for commercial judgment.

Webika has built and launched products across multiple business models. The operating test stays consistent: can the technology support a useful product and a real business?

Built and commercialized

SaaSAffiliate productsPerformance marketingAnalyticsE-commerceA physical product sold on AmazonAI-native SaaS

AI-native products in the world.

HookTide website homepage

HookTide

An AI-native LinkedIn product that models a user's voice and turns professional presence into an operating workflow.

AI-native SaaSRivi website homepage

Rivi

An AI-powered WhatsApp agent for customer engagement, review collection, and private feedback routing.

Customer engagementchatib website homepage

chatib

AI moderation, safety, analytics, product optimization, and scaling guidance for a large chat platform.

Platform advisory

Selected architecture proof

AI systems designed to be operated.

The difficult work is not calling a model. It is deciding what the model may control, how quality is checked, what failure means, and whether the economics hold.

01

Cross-vendor validation

Testimize

Deterministic ground truth feeds an OpenAI draft, Claude reviews it, and only failed sections enter a repair pass.

02

Multi-stage voice modeling

HookTide Voice Engine

Language analysis, Claude-based interpretation, OpenAI embeddings, deterministic synthesis, and a gated rewrite step.

03

Bounded agentic workflow

Rivi

A WhatsApp agent can escalate support through one controlled tool, with a three-step ceiling and deterministic fallbacks.

Also co-founded.

Wikiz / LetsQuiz

CTO & Co-Founder, 2022-2025

A real-time quiz platform that used NLP to create and update quizzes in multiple languages.

BetterHotel

Co-Founder & CTO, 2016-2018

Helped travelers get the best hotel experience for their budget, including complimentary upgrades.

Building something? Tell me about it.

For conversations about products, technology, AI, or early-stage companies, LinkedIn is the best place to reach me.

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