If you're interested in building collaborative apps but not the architectural overhead of implementing CRDTs I'd recommend checking out roomservice.dev [1]. They've begun to power some other collaborative apps such as Tella.tv [2] - realtime browser-based video editing.

[1] https://roomservice.dev [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24158509

Disclaimer: I've invested in roomservice.dev (and very excited about what they're building!). No affiliation with Tella.