cwilson's comments

cwilson | 6 years ago | on: How Figma's Multiplayer Technology Works

I have the exact opposite feeling towards this feature. It's completely changed the game at my design studio, made me a better designer, and makes us all more productive. We've gotten to the point where we'd probably turn down work if it meant we couldn't use Figma to do it.

That said, we are all producers at my studio and we also respect each other's space. Everyone designs in some capacity and we're all very comfortable in our skin. We don't really "snoop" on each others work if we know it's not time for feedback or we're not co-designing. The only time I'd pop into someones file or artboard I know they are actively working in is if I need to quickly copy/paste something I know they have (little things like this are amazing). Speaking of co-design, this is my favorite part of Figma. A few days per week we dedicate time to co-design with another person, kind of like pair-programming. Generally we both already have a base level of work complete and we talk through it, then riff on each others ideas and work to come up with something new or solve problems in different ways. Working this way at least a few days per week has really paid off for us and it's quite fun. I also feel like I learn new design tricks or skills I wouldn't have if I wasn't working this way.

I feel like between using this feature in a pre-planned way and also having some unspoken rules/constraints around how we review each others work is all you need to do to make this less of an issue. Honestly I look at it the same as literally standing over someones shoulder. I would never do that unless invited, and even then I'd prefer to sit next to them and it be more collaborative. There is also the trick, which some people do at our studio, of simply working in a private file until you're ready to paste everything into the collaborate projects. It's as simple as a copy/paste and you have complete privacy if that's what you want. We purposely do this with most of our clients so they are not tempted to leave feedback before we're ready.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: It's Time for a DevTools for Designers

I haven't considered myself a front-end developer in quite some time (at least 7-8 years), but it used to be what I'd put on my business card. Since then I've focused almost entirely on PM and Design. I have a decent front-end background, but I'm by no means pushing production code.

I recently decided to give Webflow a try after a good friend, who does happen to be a front-end dev (and quite good), told me how cool he thought it was.

He wasn't wrong. Yes, you have to pay to really do anything with your creation, but I think it might be worth it (if you're a designer who doesn't want to learn to code). I was extremely impressed with how quickly I could export my assets and various measurements from Sketch and lay everything out in Webflow, especially when it was time to build the various breakpoints and add some animations.

What would have normally taken me a few days (over the course of a few sessions), instead took me 2-3 hours, tops.

More importantly I used flexbox for much of the page, which is something I hadn't touched before. I've of course read about it and have a basic understand of how it works, but I'd have spent A LOT of time getting that aspect of it right had I been coding from scratch.

The best part was, at least from what I could tell and based on their claims, all of this would have exported to clean code worthy of a production site. Pretty cool.

So, as the author mentions, Webflow is very interesting. It's just not exactly practical because of the way it's tied to their CMS and hosting platform. If you're only really building marketing sites for clients who need basic hosting anyway, it might be perfect for you, but outside of that I can't imagine where I'd use it. Certainly not on a product team, but it's still worth playing around with on the free plan.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Google's latest iPhone rival off to a rocky start

Bluetooth is slow and unreliable unless you're using Airpods (due to the W1 chip), which I think is the more subtle move by Apple in this case. I was not a happy camper when I first read about Apple removing the headphone jack, but I won't lie, I'm an Airpod convert. They work flawlessly for me and I haven't traveled with or used normal headphones since I got them (other than a nicer pair of over-the-ears when I'm working on my desktop).

I'm not saying this excuses the removal of the headphone jack, but from a business perspective it does add up.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Nestlé Takes Majority Stake in Blue Bottle

This is very surprising, as last time I did research on this subject I remember seeing that Starbucks alone owned 40%+ of the "single cup" coffee market share. The runner up was the McDonalds/Duncan "lower end" group of coffee sales.

Specialty coffee was great for the margins, but the market-share was not even close to the numbers being reported in this article.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Why an eight-hour bus ride from Los Angeles to San Francisco might beat a flight

I've taken quite a few overnight buses during a 6 month trip through South America. Even when paying for the luxury option (which is literally $10-$15 more, totally worth it) and having fully reclining comfortable seats, it all comes down to one thing, the drivers.

If the drivers are maximizing for time you're not going to sleep very well because they are driving like a maniac. Sudden halts, near misses, and sharp corners make for a particularly terrifying experience when you're attempting to sleep.

The fact that this endeavor is focusing on drivers that go slow is 100% a positive for me and I would now consider trying it.

This is an issue that really just exists with overnight buses, as trains don't make sudden stops and they are not competing with other trains for a lane.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Update for customers with Bitcoin stored on Coinbase

This is the part I'm slightly confused by. Obviously it makes more sense to hold in your own wallet (which I do), but what happens to the BTC people decide to keep on Coinbase when a separate fork is created? If those people are not getting the BCC for "free", who is? Coinbase?

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Sprig is shutting down

Even an established chef, David Chang (of Momofuku fame here in NYC), tried something similar with a startup called Maple. Raised millions. Shut down a few weeks ago for similar reasons.

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Show HN: Real-time notes app built with Vue.js, inspired by Notational Velocity

I'm a tad confused by a few things.

Is this meant to be a cool tech demo, or a real product? I noticed the author mentioned adding new features and a premium version in another comment. This leads me to believe it's intended to be a real product.

With that in mind, I have a few questions:

1. If this is inspired by Notational Velocity, a very popular and real product, why is this also named Notational? I understand if you're doing a cool tech demo that it's not a big deal, but if you plan to charge money for this you probably shouldn't copy their name.

2. Was "Notational Velocity but real-time" your hypothesis of what would make this something people want to use/buy? If so, what about all the other very standard features that note-taking and thought storage apps have? Do you plan to hit baseline with those?

3. How do you compete with the larger companies who offer these apps for free to their users? Google Keep, Apple Notes, etc.

4. Is the real-time feature the only way you plan to make this different/better than the others?

I'm not trying to be a downer here, but I feel like I see "X app but real-time" posted to HN on a weekly basis now, like it being real-time is going to be the differentiator that makes it wildly popular. Those products then go on to ignore half the reasons why the others have users. Even if they reach feature parity, their one differentiator is "well, it's real-time". I'm not sure that's enough.

If this is just meant to be a cool demo of Vue.js (with an awesome homepage), well done, ignore my comments =)

cwilson | 8 years ago | on: Carnegie Mellon Offers New Master's Degree in Product Management

This is the part I'm the most confused about with this program. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I don't think this part of PM can be taught. The lessons learned from interacting with designers and engineers is something only experience can grant you, and a lot of that typically comes from being a designer or engineer yourself prior to getting into PM full-time.

cwilson | 9 years ago | on: Twitter Suspends Prominent Alt-Right Accounts

I'd never thought of that before. Trump values his Twitter account quite a bit. What could he do if Twitter decided to suspend him as a protest?

I don't think this will ever happen, but it's an interesting hypothetical.

cwilson | 10 years ago | on: Poor New Yorkers Tend to Live Longer Than Other Poor Americans

The walking and the stairs. So many stairs. I don't know many friends who live in buildings with elevators, especially in the outer boroughs. We live in a four-story walk-up in Brooklyn, have stairs in our duplex to go to the second story/loft, and walk up and down subway stairs on a daily basis. So all those stairs plus generally walking everywhere around the city equals a lot more exercise on a daily basis than the average person (is my guess).

It's night and day versus growing up in Austin, where I drove everywhere, rarely used stairs, and walking consisted of taking out the garbage to the curb.

cwilson | 10 years ago | on: Asana

As a very heavy day to day user, my biggest three complaints are:

1. Ability to "lock" a row. We often build lists in Asana that are not meant to be tasks. It's great for project planning or status boards. The problem is everything in Asana is very easily checked off or moved, which sometimes can happen by accident. This provides a feeling of fleetingness that I think makes some people (especially super detail oriented project managers) nervous.

2. Native Apps. I really need a great official OSX native app. The iOS app, while it has gotten better, has always felt like an afterthought to the company.

3. Notifications. This is the main reason I want a solid OSX app. I need notifications to work really well. If something is important and needs my attention, I need to instantly know about it (and knowing about it via a push notification on my phone isn't good enough). Slack has cut down on email usage for us, like many, significantly. I don't check email as much now, so I can't rely on email notifications for our primary project management tool.

Overall Asana is great. I always end up going back to it after using other tools. I do agree however there are a few small things that would help to make it feel a bit more "grown up".

cwilson | 10 years ago | on: Show HN: Consol – Desktop First Productivity with End-to-End Encryption

I'm definitely intrigued. We've used everything under the sun and always end up falling back to Asana (we're a small design agency).

Looking forward to trying this out!

Edit: You guys might want to be a bit more clear that you're requiring a credit card to signup for beta access, even if you're not charging for 30 days.

cwilson | 10 years ago | on: Tech workers are increasingly looking to leave Silicon Valley

Made the transition from SV to Brooklyn. Wages are basically the same, housing is much more affordable (our apartment would be at least 2k more per month in San Francisco), and there are people here who do things that are not tech! Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of startups and great companies with offices in Brooklyn and Manhattan, but it's SO refreshing to be around people who don't just want to pitch their startup or talking about growth hacking.

I'm very happy with the change. I do miss the beauty of the pacific northwest, but otherwise it's been great.

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