You've probably already heard me talking about this, but the first ONCE product from 37signal is available now, it's called Campfire. The idea is that instead of paying for Slack forever, you pay for this once, I really hope more of these types of products take off. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAzRUbE1AAw

After selling their Freehand tool to Miro in November last year, InVision have just announced they'll be shutting down at the end of 2024. It's kind of crazy to see how quickly the rise and fall of a company like this can happen. They had a valuable of over $2billion just a few years ago, I remember when you basically couldn't move in the design world without seeing InVision everywhere. It's not surprising, Figma basically took all the utility away from InVision - and even Sketch has it's own prototyping too these days (but who still uses Sketch anyway?) Still, I think InVision played a big role in modernising design collaboration, so it's kind of a shame we won't see anything else from then again. If you wanna read a bit more, you can check out the announcement from the CEO

I fucking love Valve. I love that they kind figured out their cash-cow with Steam and then proceeded to just take as long as they like tinkering on new things like the Valve Index, The Steam Deck, Portal etc etc. I don't know any other provate company in the world that is as big, influential but also as weird as Valve. They really just seem to do their own thing without any pressure from the outside world. I don't care if their famous handbook from years ago was more of a hiring stunt, there's something about companies like Valve, and I guess Teenage Engineering that I love. That's actually all I have to say while waiting for my Steam Deck OLED to arrive :D

Hey friends, Just recorded little summary of some of the stories I've been following, and some interesting product updates I've come across over the last week. What I talk about - OpenAI - What might have causes the ruckus, and lessons to be gleaned? - Binance - Another scandal in the crypto scene. - Sam Bank Fried the fish trader - An interesting update for Google's Bard - An awesome looking AI image generator I can't wait to play with. I'll keep refining this, but any feedback on the format would be appreciated!

https://hu.ma.ne/aipin In case you missed it, but a few ex-Apple folks are launching this new AI-device that some people claim will "kill the iPhone" – a statement we've heard too many times and I sincerely doubt it in this case too. But anyway, the product seems cool and all, but I think their landing page promoting the product has some really strange use-cases. Here is a gratuitous rant: The first use-case is a person looking up moon phases and moon photographs. I'm aware this is probably a cultural thing, but the notion of talking out loud on the bus to speak to my Humane Pin is INSANE to me. I would never do that. Secondly, he is looking up information about photographs, a visual medium by definition, using a device that can project TEXT 🤨 – why not show someone buying tickets for the bus or similar? Then we have the skateboarder listening to skateboard music *sigh*. As an old skateboarder myself, I can tell you that it's not exactly quiet and pleasant when you're riding a skateboard. It's near impossible to hear anything other than the skateboard wheels' rough assault on the asphalt. This just felt like a cringe example where a desperately out-of-touch Creative Director said, 'we need something that speaks to the kids!'. I would have accepted it somewhat it if they showed that the skateboarder had Bluetooth earphones, but she doesn't. They seem to mean that you should walk/ride around listening to music or talking on the phone via speakers like an annoying teenager. This product's success is relying on changing lots of behaviors and mental models. I think we all know how easy that is. Google Glass anyone? It will only happen if the user can get an incredible advantage compared to the old behavior. I don't see how this product meaningfully improves anything to the extent that it will become adopted further than the tech and product nerds like us :D End of rant. Am I wrong, will this be an actual iPhone-killer? Curious to hear if anyone in this group has a take on this – and what do you think about the marketing?