This is my most ambitious project so far.

This is my most ambitious project so far. Not because it's another big website. It isn't, at least not yet. What matters is the system behind it.

For years I've had several side projects about the Azores. Each one has its own purpose, its own audience, its own reason to exist. But most of them need the same things: places, events, local updates, media, categories, locations, and structured content about the islands.

The problem is that each project ends up with its own database. That works at first. It's fast, it's simple, you build the thing and move on. But after a while the same information lives in too many places. A point of interest gets added to one project and not another. An event that's useful for three sites has to be entered three times. Media is uploaded again and again. Categories are recreated. The structure ends up slightly different everywhere.

Then the data starts to drift.

That's what I want to stop with acores9.

The idea is one central source of truth about the Azores. A place to manage reusable content properly: news, events, points of interest, websites, channels, media, and structured access to all of it. The same content can feed several projects instead of being copied or rebuilt for each one.

I've wanted to do this for a long time, but the scale of it as a side project always felt insane. It's not just building pages. It's finding the information, organizing it, keeping it current, connecting it properly, and making it useful across different projects. For years the tools weren't there. AI tools for searching, processing, organizing, and feeding content into a system like this simply didn't exist the way they do now.

The first projects that benefit are geoacores and azoressurf. geoacores needs structured information about places, geography, and points of interest. azoressurf needs surf content: beaches, spots, local context, updates, media. Different projects, but they share far more than it first looks.

So instead of treating them as isolated websites, I want them to share the same foundation. That doesn't mean they become the same. Each keeps its own focus, design, and tone. But the base information shouldn't have to be duplicated by hand. A point of interest exists once and is used wherever it fits. An event is created once and published to the channels that make sense. A future project starts from a full database instead of an empty one.

This also frees up the frontend. When the content isn't trapped inside each project's own database and admin, the websites can focus on the experience. A more modern approach with React, better interfaces, smoother interactions, animations, UI that feels good on desktop and mobile. Some projects need to be fast and simple. Others deserve a richer interface. A map, a surf site, and a tourism portal shouldn't all be limited by the same old content structure. With acores9 handling the data layer, the frontend gets to be flexible.

But the bigger point isn't websites. A large part of acores9 is API access. I want this information usable by other systems, not locked inside an admin panel. That matters even more now because of AI.

If I'm building with agents, assistants, importers, and content workflows, they need a reliable source of truth. They shouldn't guess from scattered pages or scrape duplicated content. They should be able to ask the system for structured information and get back something clean.

That's where API and MCP access come in. The API is for the projects and tools that read or manage the data. MCP is for making the system usable by AI agents in a controlled way. Instead of handing an AI vague access to everything, I expose specific actions and specific data flows. Search for duplicates before creating content. Check if a place already exists. Create a draft. Attach media. Read channel rules. Pull the right content for a specific site. These workflows become possible once the data is organized and the access is intentional.

That's why acores9 feels different from my other projects. It isn't a website idea. It's infrastructure for future websites, future tools, modern interfaces, and future AI workflows. That changes how I think about the whole thing.

The admin area matters. The database structure matters. The API matters. The MCP tools matter. Duplicate detection, content types, channels, permissions. All of it matters. The boring parts are the point.

If this is done well, every new project gets easier. I don't start from zero. I don't recreate the same Azores information again and again. I build the layer that makes each project unique and let acores9 handle the shared foundation.

This is also the base for the larger acores9 tourism portal I have in mind. But I don't want to jump into a public portal before the system underneath is ready. A tourism portal is only as good as the information behind it: organized, reusable, easy to maintain.

So the first phase is backend work: admin tools, APIs, MCP tools, content modeling, media handling, import workflows, tests, permissions, clean structure. It's not the visible work. It's the work that makes everything else possible.

I like this direction because it fits how my projects actually evolve. I rarely know the final shape at the start. But I do know that good structured information about the Azores is useful in a lot of contexts: maps, surf, tourism, events, guides, directories, local news, AI-powered tools. Those shouldn't be disconnected databases. They should be connected.

That's what acores9 is becoming: the central layer between the information, the websites, and the tools that use it.

There's still a lot to build. Some parts will change. Some ideas will get simpler, others more complex than expected. That's normal. But the direction feels right.

I'm building this because I don't want every side project to start from zero anymore. I want each new one to benefit from the work already done, and I want the information to get stronger over time instead of scattering across separate systems. I want it ready for the way software is changing. Not just pages, not just admin forms, but a source of truth that websites, APIs, modern frontends, and AI agents can all use.

What's already taking shape:

• An admin and human verification layer, where I can manage, review, and verify information before it goes public

• An API layer, so several websites can fetch the same trusted information instead of each keeping its own copy

• An MCP layer, so agents can search, check for duplicates, prepare drafts, and feed the main structure through the same controlled system

That's the ambition: a shared foundation for everything I want to build around the Azores.