GitHub Spark and Reddit's global translation takeover
GitHub Spark and Reddit's global translation takeover
Plus: How to design for Gen-Z, Python overtakes Javascript, Notion Marketplace and the first official definition of “open” AI
Hi product people 👋, I hope you’re all doing well. It’s been one of those weeks where there’s almost too much to cover in one briefing with major new announcements from Notion, GitHub, Miro, Shopify and more.
We’ll cover everything you need to know plus a new tool that lets you transform Figma files into user stories, Arc browser’s new strategic conundrum and some thoughts on why conventional UX wisdom might not be applicable to Gen-Z.
As always, if you enjoy the briefing, hit the like button and if you prefer an audio-visual version, you can also watch this on YouTube.
Enjoy the rest of your week!
Key reads and resources for product teams
New from the Department of Product Substack
Knowledge Series - How to use NotebookLM at work for tech debt, ideation, market analysis and more
In this Knowledge Series tutorial, we’re going to take a look at what Google NotebookLM is and more importantly - how you can use it at work for professional tasks you might not have considered before including: managing tech debt, market analysis / strategy creation, user research, creative ideation using books you’ve read and more.
More from the Knowledge Series:
(Department of Product)
Case study - How Figma built its new AI search tool
Figma’s product and design teams spent months building their new AI search tool. They started out with some basic assumptions which later proved to be wrong. Figma's AI search feature evolved from an initial design autocomplete idea during a hackathon to a more comprehensive search solution. In this piece, they explain the principles they followed and why they ultimately changed direction to build something users actually wanted. (Figma Design blog)
UX - Why it might be a good idea to ignore conventional design advice for Gen-Z
Every generation is different in very unique ways, with different habits, views, standards and expectations. So when designing for Gen Z, what do we need to keep in mind? In this piece, Vitaly Friedman suggests that designers need to approach designing products for Gen-Z slightly differently. Some of his suggestions and principles for designers to consider include:
Mobile-only not mobile first
Subtitles on by default
Remain authentic and genuine
To some, their main search engine is YouTube, not Google
Many have never heard of Internet Explorer
(Vitaly Friedman, LinkedIn)
Strategy - How to design products that won’t be become obsolete
Tesla’s receive software upgrades that regularly improve their performance; tunable eyeglass lenses can adjust for changes in vision, Toys can be reconfigured to suit children of varying abilities. In a market that increasingly emphasizes flexibility, durability, and environmentalism, companies that make the shift from static offerings to products that grow will position themselves for success. (Harvard Business Review)
New product features and innovation this week
GitHub has announced a major new product called GitHub Spark - a new AI tool that allows users to describe what they want to build using natural language and build a “micro-app” or “Spark”. To build a micro-app, users start with an initial prompt and then Spark will show you a live preview within a few seconds. From there, users can fine-tune it by going back and forth with the bot.
For product teams, this isn’t designed to replace the entire codebase of a product. Instead, these micro-apps or Sparks could be used for things like small prototypes and MVPs. Watch it in action here.
Notion held its first global conference called “Make With Notion” where it unveiled a series of new product updates. These included a new form building tool, customizable layouts for published sites, enhanced automations and perhaps the two biggest of all: a new Notion Marketplace and Mail. The marketplace will allow users to buy and sell custom built templates and Notion will take a 10% off all purchases. The network effects of launching a marketplace should mean more users building and sharing templates within the Notion ecosystem but does this risk alienating power users who sell templates direct?
Miro has announced a new “Innovation Space” which promises to let users turn boards into artifacts like product briefing documents and interactive prototypes. It sounds great, but the proof will be in the pudding. The waitlist is open now.
Meanwhile…
After last week’s announcement from Anthropic, Chrome is reportedly also getting a new AI assistant that can perform actions on behalf of users. It’s known internally as Project Jarvis and looks set to be one of the most transformative changes ever to come to Chrome.
Speaking of browsers, the Browser Company’s CEO has confirmed plans for a second browser after the first, Arc, proved to be too difficult to use for mass adoption.
Product teams are often faced with this dilemma: should we risk alienating our existing offering by adapting it for mass adoption or stick to building something for a smaller, niche audience? Arc is attempting to do both by keeping Arc for niche users and building a separate, standalone product set to launch in 2025, designed to appeal to the masses.
This feels like a risky move. Sure, VC funded startups have to reach scale, but why not just adapt Arc to make it more mainstream given the significant brand equity it has already built up - even if that risks alienating some early adopters?
In other news…
LinkedIn has launched its first hiring assistant and it’s appropriately called Hiring Assistant. It’ll help recruiters with things like writer job descriptions, ingesting notes and sourcing and engaging with candidates. Sometimes the simplest names work best.
Shopify has launched a dedicated new finance product for sellers called Shopify Finance. It consolidates everything a seller needs to know about the financial side of their business including revenue, tax calculations, payouts and dedicated new financial products including small business loans. Given that a massive 74% of Shopify’s total revenue comes from merchant solutions including payment processing fees, it’s not difficult to see why Shopify has decided to lean deeper into finance.
Tools you can use
Figflow is a product that lets you translate designs into user stories. It connects directly to Figma, analyzes designs and generates estimations automatically.
Micdrop lets you mute your mic across all apps like Teams, Zoom, Slack, Meet - without having to fiddle around to find the mute or unmute button. Instead it is permanently located in the menu bar.
Tabnine’s AI code assistant streamlines code generation and automates mundane tasks so developers can spend more time on the work they love.
📈 Product data and trends to stay informed
Reddit’s investment in machine translation is paying off. The company says its weekly active unique users increased an impressive 53% YoY to 365.4 million million and Revenues were up by 68% to $348 million. A big driver of its growth was the rollout of its machine translation technology which has allowed it to expand to additional countries.
Reddit says more than half of user growth was driven by international traffic. And since Reddit’s translated content is indexed in search engines, they are seeing an acceleration in top of the funnel traffic, too.
Snap also reported earnings this week with revenues of $1.3 billion, up 15% YoY and 443 million DAUs, up 9% YoY.
A new McKinsey report identifies 18 areas of future competition. It predicts, among other things, that the global number of households with streaming services will grow from 670 million in 2022 to over 1 billion in 2040.
Meta’s Ray-Ban glasses are the top selling product in 60% of Ray-Ban stores in EMEA.
OpenAI’s CFO says that ChatGPT now has over 250 million weekly active users and that 5-6% of those sign up for the paid product. Not a bad conversion rate at all but we’re still in the early adopter phase where early users are potentially more willing to pay.
Python has overtaken Javascript as the most popular programming language on GitHub in 2024.
Despite Stripe’s acquisition and vote of confidence in stablecoins, 63% of the American public still don’t trust cryptocurrencies.
Other product news in brief
📖We finally have an official definition of “open” AI - but Meta isn’t happy.
💰X has hiked up the price of its API products from $100 to $200
🫡Dropbox is laying off 20% of its staff.
🤖Google won’t be shipping its AI agents until next year.
📚ElevenLabs has acqui-hired the teams at Omnivore to help build their new reader product
The Weekly Briefing is a product-led perspective of what’s happening in tech - and why it matters to product teams.
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