Briefing: GA4 simplified, Spotify leaks, Copilot songs
Plus: Product leaders on the future of product design, payment terminology explained, Uber's new patent
Welcome to the 200+ people who signed up for the newsletter this past week! Over 40,000 readers from companies including Netflix, Amazon, Spotify, Google and more now get the weekly briefing to stay up to date with what’s happening in tech - and why it matters for product builders.
Hi product people 👋, Rich Holmes here.
As the year draws to a close you’ve probably got one eye on the upcoming holiday and one eye on all the work that needs to be done in January. Well, thanks to a new product, one way to handle stakeholder requests in the new year is to clone yourself. Delphi is a new startup that allows you to build an AI version of yourself that can scale your knowledge and expertise. It works by allowing you to upload every piece of content you’ve created from places like Slack, Discord, Notion and other sources to build a profile - or clone - that can interact with others via chat. In all honesty, it’s probably not quite yet ready to handle complex stakeholder queries and negotiations, but it’s a unique way to think about building AI models with practical use cases nonetheless.
In other news this week, Adobe’s proposed acquisition of Figma is officially dead. The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority made it clear in its previous findings that it was proposing 2 remedies: prohibit the merger altogether or divest significant parts of the companies that caused competition concerns. With the EU also likely to block the deal, Adobe and Figma decided to call it quits. While the news may put a smile on some product design teams’ faces who will no longer face the prospect of contending with Figma’s incorporation into the Adobe Creative Suite, there could be consequences for the broader startup ecosystem. If exit routes are narrowed, does this hamper investment - and in turn, innovation?
Meanwhile, among the many significant things that happened in product this year, near the top of some product teams’ lists is the rollout of Google Analytics 4. The launch was met with mixed reviews from users but as a result we’ve seen the release of a series of new products designed to make using GA4 easier. One of these is Findly, which simplifies the entire GA4 report experience by allowing you to chat with your data to get exactly what you want.
Finally, as we look ahead to 2024, hybrid working patterns look set to stay but there’s still some debate about how compensation should change based on location. If you’re considering how to set up your own remote work compensation structures, this guide by Affirm should help.
Enjoy the rest of your week (and your break, if you’re celebrating) - and we’ll be back in two weeks time!
Essential reads for product teams
New from the Department of Product this week
🧠 The Knowledge Series - Payment terminology explained
If you’ve ever had the opportunity to work on a feature or project which involved implementing a new payment provider, you’ll know that the process is not much fun if you don’t understand some of the terminology you’re forced to deal with in the payment world. In this Knowledge Series, we explore some of the most useful payment terminology you need to know. (Department of Product)
Velocity - Microsoft’s CTO Kevin Scott on developer productivity
Productivity isn’t just a measure of the number of lines of code written. Instead, it’s figuring out how long it takes to get value to users and identifying points of friction throughout that entire lifecycle. Kevin Scott shares his view on measuring developer productivity. (X)
Technical case studies - How LinkedIn uses machine learning to identify your skills
LinkedIn's new Skill Extraction model helps to build more than 41,000 skills that are used to match users with job vacancies.It extracts skills from user profiles, course completion certificates and job ad descriptions to build a complex skills graph. In this piece by the company’s engineering teams, they outline the ways they use machine learning to do it. (LinkedIn Engineering Blog)
Podcast - How AI changes the future of product design
The chief product officers of Spotify, Adobe and LinkedIn discuss how AI will transform the future of product design. Topics include: AI transitioning from a support role to being the main product, with TikTok as a paradigm shift example, the debate over the significance of AI model size versus data quantity, the need for workforce adaptation, including skills in effective AI prompting and evolving business models and a comparison of how established companies and startups are positioned to leverage AI. (20VC Podcast)
Design - In-depth analysis of modern iOS navigation patterns
Written by UI designer Frank Rausch, this collection of navigation patterns includes drill-downs, modals, pyramids, sequences and more. Designed to be used by product teams as a reference point when building mobile apps. (Frank Rausch)
Tools you can use
Worklink - transform the stuff you create at work into assets you can sell
Flowla - help your sales team create a branded product demo page which includes all of your materials in one place
OpenMeter - Collect and aggregate usage of your product to use for billing and insights
New product features, launches and announcements this week
Microsoft’s Copilot can turn prompts into songs thanks to an integration with Suno. If you’re musically inclined and want to celebrate your team’s achievements this year, this could be a fun way to do it. I asked it to write a song about not achieving my OKRs and here’s what it came up with.
Spotify reportedly plans to introduce a prompt-based playlist generation feature and a chatbot that also uses an integration with Suno. Does AI-generated playlists coupled with an integration with Suno mean that Spotify is finally on a path towards profitability without paying record companies? You can watch a (unconfirmed) demo of it in action here.
Chrome has announced that from January 4th, it will begin testing Tracking Protection, a new feature that limits cross-site tracking by restricting website access to third-party cookies by default. The gradual phasing out of third party cookies has significant implications for product teams and will mean first party data becomes even more important. Privacy advocates welcome the shift away from third party cookies but some commentators are wondering whether Chrome’s recent decline in market share sparks the beginning of the end of its dominance. 📈Chartpack on product marketing trends.
Twilio has unveiled a single identity feature which allows users of its apps to seamlessly switch between Twilio, Segment and SendGrid.
Uber has filed a patent for a location-spoofing detection system which determines the probability that a driver falsified their location. The company is cracking down on a trend where some drivers fake trips using GPS signal spoofers.
📈 Product data and trends to stay informed
AWS reportedly has over 100,000 employees and Amazon is planning a major restructure in an effort to reduce costs and address complaints from customers. Here’s how AWS’ employee numbers compare with other major tech companies:
Just under 20% of teens say they’re on YouTube and TikTok almost constantly (16% and 17% respectively). Only 3% say the same for Facebook. Full Pew Report on teens, social media and technology 2023.
The yearly SaaS churn rate for enterprise customers is 6-10% vs 58% for SMBs. The average number of SaaS products enterprise companies use has grown from 80 in 2020 to 130 in 2022. Annual subscription plans are now the most popular with 42% of users choosing to pay annually.
The top Netflix show of the year amassed 812,100,100 in hours viewed.
Instacart says it has helped brick-and-mortar grocers in the US increase their revenues by $7.96 billion since launching, according to its annual Economic Impact Report.
Lol is not universal. Different cultures laugh differently online. Dwl, muoio, laul, jajaja and ptdr are some examples of how different countries like to express laughter. Worth bearing in mind for product internationalization efforts.
Other product news in brief
The New York Times is hiring its first AI leader, tasked with establishing principles for how writers can use generative AI.
OpenAI announced that its nonprofit board will play a more active role in model approval.
Scooter startup Bird has filed for bankruptcy, just 2 years after its IPO in 2021.
Notion has unveiled a new CTO, Fuzzy Khosrowshahi who previously created Google Sheets.
The DOP Weekly Briefing is a product-led perspective of what’s happening in tech - and why it matters to product teams. If you want more than the Weekly Briefing, paid subscribers also get access to in-depth DOP Deep dives, The Knowledge Series and Chartpacks.
If you enjoyed this week’s Department of Product briefing, hit the like button below! ❤️
Well, Delphi looks as incredible as it is terrifying! Thanks for sharing.
I had totally forgotten about the Adobe/Figma deal it’s been going on for a such a long time. Thanks for the updates Rich!