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hi bud buds,
last week, openai introduced new features that let chatgpt:
transcribe meetings
reference files in dropbox, box, onedrive, sharepoint, and google drive (aka, most places where companies save files)
before we go any further, let’s pay our respects to the countless ai startups that just got absolutely merked by this news. we will never forget you.
still, none of this should be all that surprising. i feel there’s a growing consensus that the mega ai labs (e.g. openai, google, claude, meta, anthropic) are going to keep expanding horizontally until they touch every part of our digital (and irl) lives.
if you’re like me (wondering what this means for your future career outside of a mega ai lab), my current hypothesis is the best path forward will be to niche down: picking the narrowest vertical your brain can handle, and going deep on a single user persona. in these niche vertical markets, the roi will be too low for the big labs to bother entering — but substantial enough for entrepreneurs and small companies to build excellent tiny businesses.
in summary, i’m assuming most horizontal software startups are living on borrowed time, until the mega ai labs death star them too. what’s left will be verticals: small, random, underserved markets where real people still need good software to make their lives a bit easier.
xoxo,
dj
this week’s sponsor: 1440 media
use the link below to check them out so i can buy some cool clothes for the summer.
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last week’s product releases
hell yeah
uber launched senior accounts, a simplified app for elderly users: big text, family ride updates, and medicare flex card support. this makes my heart happy
tiktok released tiktok for artists, a dashboard for musicians to see engagement data and promote releases. extremely bullish on analytics for the creator economy
tiktok added smart keyword filters, a natural language tool to filter content on your feed. awesome application of llm’s strength in “extremely fuzzy search”
anthropic launched custom claude models for u.s. national security, with emphasis on language + cybersecurity capabilities. yay for our government getting more efficient with ai 🫡
i’m getting too old for this shit
character.ai dropped ai video generation + social feeds, letting users create / share ai character videos on a social feed
snapchat launched a snapchat apple watch app
mildly interesting
google delaying the launch of ask photos, a natural language search feature in google photos. i’m a google photos power user but rarely use this feature — anyone here that does? i don’t really see the recurring use case here
mistral released mistral code, an ai coding assistant for vibe coding
bearish
venmo released new debit card benefits, including tap-to-pay, scheduled transfers, and no foreign transaction fees. none of these feel significant enough to get me to use venmo any more than i do now
peloton dropped repowered, a peer-to-peer marketplace for secondhand peloton gear. this feels like a very incremental bet won’t put a dent into their existential tam issues. feel like they should be focusing more on bigger swings
microsoft launched bing video creator, a sora-powered tool that generates video from text. huge news for all 17 bing users worldwide
adobe launched photoshop beta for android, offering masking, layering, and ai tools. feels like a hyper competitive space dominated by canva and other mobile-native platforms, but makes sense as a defensive play
google is re-entering the ai glasses space with android xr: ai glasses built to resemble regular eyewear. as a lifelong glasses wearer, i think glasses are not the format that will win (too uncomfortable). my bet: ai <> headphones
that’s it for this week.
bye bye; i love you all. see you next week!
love, dj