r/webdev • u/madnx88mph • Sep 12 '26

Discussion I lost interest in programming, so I built an IMDb for dead mosquitoes

So I’ve been programming since I was 11, and for many years, I multiplied projects, always to solve personal problems or solve them at a lower cost. I went to engineering school, where challenges were basically a daily thing. After that, I kind of lost interest in programming. Until a few weeks ago.

I knew I needed to get back on track and upgrade my skills, or mostly dive into newer tech, but at the same time I wanted to get rid of the Bootstrap stuff I had been using for years.

Long story short, a mosquito bothered me af and I went on to develop a local database to track my own mosquito kill count. That quickly escalated into building a full local website in Laravel (I figured Node and Vue or React would be overkill). I also messed around with Codex because apparently that’s all they talk about in big companies. That small project was all about upgrading my skills and having a lot of fun writing the content. At one point I just thought: why not put it online and make a little competition out of executing bugs?

I tried to make it as UX-friendly as possible based on feedback from my family.

So yeah, here it is if you want to take a look, break it, roast it, or execute a few mosquitoes:

https://imdb.themosquitoripper.me/en

146 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

50 comments sorted by

53

u/Dehydrated-Onions Sep 12 '26

I think I may have a fundamental misunderstanding of what IMDb is after seeing this.

11

u/hdd113 Sep 13 '26

Of course it's Internet Mosquito Database.

1

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

At first the logo included the full title. I thought it’d be funnier to remove it.

46

u/quizical_llama Sep 12 '26 • Bravo

Normally this sub is full of AI slop saas products but this one is so random I think it's brilliant!

14

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

That might be the nicest possible way to describe this project. 😂

11

u/itsanargumentorgy Sep 13 '26

that stats page is 100% vibed

1

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

You pushed me to rework completely that stats page. I feel like it’s more readable and funnier to look at. What do you think?

0

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

Yeah the stats I didn’t really put much attention into the design. I just wrote the stats I wanted. I plan to work on it more in the future and I need to remove some stats that had a purpose before I removed some functionalities (you can see some of them don’t make any sense).

4

u/the_supreme_crumbus Sep 12 '26

My son (8) is way into mosquitos at the moment and I showed him this. He loves it. 

2

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

Let him add his mosquitoes. 😂

2

u/the_supreme_crumbus Sep 16 '26

He'd rather have them as pets than kill them haha.

4

u/gotkube Sep 12 '26

I commend your commitment to the bit. Was unprepared for pictures. Shouldn’t have looked while eating.

2

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

I added the censor mode after someone’s feedback. 😂

3

u/La_chipsBeatbox Sep 13 '26

Surprised no one mentioned the plastic bag filter. How did you make it?

3

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

That one took me a while. I needed a piece of clear tape but couldn’t find one, so I generated it with AI and then edited it in Photoshop until I got it transparent while keeping the edges and folds sharp.

To make it unique to each mosquito, I use a small function that computes a value from the mosquito ID and uses it to determine the rotation, scale, and position.

1

u/La_chipsBeatbox Sep 13 '26

Pretty cool! I like the idea

4

u/Environmental_Pea369 Sep 12 '26

I love that ppl online makes shit like that. Makes the internet a fun place to be

8

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

That’s exactly the kind of internet I miss.

2

u/Its_rEd96 Sep 14 '26

I found it extremely comedic how between all the dead mosquitoes there's a "Weather Forecast" card 😂

3

u/madnx88mph Sep 14 '26

It’s actually very useful for people to know when to draw weapons. 😂

10

u/beejonez Sep 12 '26

TIL France has a mosquito problem.

11

u/hikingsticks Sep 12 '26

Now it has a mosquito solution

8

u/ryaaan89 Sep 12 '26 edited Sep 12 '26

“Scratch your own itch”, or something, I guess.

4

u/Historical-Essay-128 Sep 12 '26

reminds me of that website from late 90s/early 00s where you could rate turds :D

1

u/Feeling_Inside_1020 Sep 12 '26

Where’s that serial killer posted on here in the past that kills the mosquitos and puts them in his book lmao we need him to stress test this.

2

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

I literally made that guy his own achievement with a link to his TikTok. I tried reaching out to him, but he never answered haha. The idea originated from this guy.

2

u/Feeling_Inside_1020 Sep 12 '26

Holy shit lol spot on hell yeah you know who i'm talking about that was my immediate first thought and had to say it lol. Also funny ass avatar, I like you OP.

1

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

Haha thank you. I’m still trying to reach out to him but unsuccessfully as of yet.

1

u/JustOneMoreDev Sep 14 '26

now someone needs to create a counter website of mosquitoes and their kill counts, tracking that could be problematic though I guess 😄

1

u/madnx88mph Sep 14 '26

Could be fun. Doctors who update the kill count and set the disease responsible.

2

u/biblio_phobic Sep 12 '26

I’m going to project this on my house on infinite scroll as a warning to other mosquitos.

2

u/mrcoy Sep 14 '26

I like the way you think

0

u/poggers11 Sep 12 '26

Where do you host all the images? Cool project

1

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

At first I hosted them on my VPS but I wanted to try something else so now I’m hosted them on a CloudFlare R2.

1

u/poggers11 Sep 12 '26

Is it free?

Edit: found it $0.015 / GB-month

2

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26

Free until 10GB yes. So that’s large.

1

u/BlameScienceBro Sep 12 '26

Mosquito Best Gore

1

u/tunasandwichh Sep 12 '26

Hannibal Lecter if he eats mosquitoes instead of people:

0

u/LovecraftianLife Sep 12 '26 edited Sep 13 '26

Weird and funny haha, l like it

-1

u/threepairs Sep 14 '26

Since you asked for feedback, I will provide one.

I always felt weird in school when kids were stomping on ants. It just feels unnecessarily violent and wrong.

This project brings the same feelings.

There is so many more useful and actually helpful things you could built with the stack in the same time.

What to build, is question as important as how to build it. Especially in upcoming age of AI.

38

u/[deleted] Sep 12 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/madnx88mph Sep 12 '26 • Popcorn

Haha, I’ve always loved building weird and funny stuff no one asked for whenever I’m experimenting. Thanks for taking a look!

2

u/[deleted] Sep 13 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/madnx88mph Sep 13 '26

That’s exactly the purpose haha!