Hi, hello! First of all, a warm welcome to new subscribers — I’m so happy to have you here! Second, it’s almost the weekend; time to swap work scrolling for doom scrolling. In today’s digest, I’m covering a new social media app with some MySpace-era vibes. But first…
The headlines:
☑️ X is removing the ability for paid users to hide their blue ticks.
🗣️ ChatGPT got a big upgrade— expect more direct, less verbose answers.
🪦Say goodbye to Google One VPN as it joins the Google Graveyard.
Cast your mind back to 2020. The pandemic was in full swing. Everyone was baking banana bread, and makers everywhere used their newfound isolation to knuckle down on some passion projects. One of them was Tyler Bainbridge.
After about a month of working in Meta, Tyler hankered to start his own thing, and like many in tech at the time, a Substack was the obvious choice. Alongside a few of his friends, he launched Perfectly Imperfect, a newsletter where some big-time celebs (but most not) gave recommendations for things like movies, music, lifestyle choices, and everything in between, with the mission of “helping people break out of their algorithm.”
Fast forward to 2024, the newsletter has grown to around 65,000 subscribers and has been featured across the mediasphere in places like the New York Times, NPR, and Vanity Fair.
What next? Over the course of a summer, Tyler built PI.FYI, a new social app that allows everyone to sign up and post their own recommendations for their friends to see.
The app has a decidedly MySpace-esque vibe, with just a hint of Brooklyn café. Once you fill in your details, PI.FYI will generate a profile page that almost looks like it was designed in MS Paint (in a good way). It’s kind of like a landing page where all your recommendations will live. You can even pick a specific theme from a fairly healthy collection of options.
Once your profile is live, it’s time to engage! You can recommend pretty much anything for any topic, whether it’s movies, games, drinks, or even Twitter hacks. You can also ask for recommendations, so you might find me asking for new writing tools.
If you’d like to give it a shot, PI.FYI is currently available for iOS, and if you do, don’t forget to follow me!
- Chapter One analyzes your resume to ensure you’re putting your best foot forward.
- Knoiz lets you create Spotify playlists with AI by using keywords.
- twiBook enables you to create, organize, and filter all of your Twitter bookmarks.
- Musho is a prompt-powered AI design assistant that lives inside Figma.
- Hyperdoc uses AI to generate flash cards that help you close deals faster.
- Flexi Domain lets you add multiple domains to the same site or app.