Owen Williams - Write Together

In this episode, we kick it with Owen Williams, most recognized for his previous work as an editor at The Next Web and maker of the well-regarded technology newsletter re:Charged. From his broad experience as a journalist and software engineer, we’re going to discuss his latest product launch, Write Together.

We cover a broad range of topics including:

• the evolution of content creation
• why it's important to write every day
• PHP frameworks
• his super nifty Slack hack
• and much more

Lean more about Makers Weekly and what we're working on here.

Notable Mentions

Vanmoof (2:45) - awesome futuristic smart bikes

Product Hunt (3:19) - a daily list of new products around the web

Ryan Hoover (11:47) - founder of Product Hunt

Medium (6:25) - a modern, social blogging platform

Github streaks (8:10) - a visual indicator of the frequency a developer commits code to a project

Lean Startup (12:30) - a product development methodology (and book) that focuses on rapid prototyping and constant product iteration with the goal to capture learnings cheap, fast, and often.

React (14:35) - a modern Javascript framework for developing web interfaces. See ReactNative for mobile

Laravel and their billing framework, Cashier (14:50)

Getstream (15:39) - out of the box social networking features, like news feeds and timelines.

Stripe (16:10) - credit card processor for internet products

Segment (16:11) - data analytics platform

Chart Mogul (16:17) - out of the box operations portal for SaaS businesses

Bear Metrics (16:27) - similar to Chart Mogul but a bit more robust and more expensive

Google's Startup Program (16:43) - free cloud hosting!!

Sentry (17:15) - Error tracking, Owen integrates with Slack for alerts

Slack (17:16) - Owen routes all of his alerts into a Slack via their API, check out all slack integrations

MailChimp (23:00) - email distribution and marketing platform

Google Reader (23:16) - RIP

Extra Extra

• How do you become a better writer? Well, you need to write. This is the premise of the Write Together product. Here's a great article (and interesting story) about how consistent writing can provide meaningful benefits over time; it has over 20k claps on Medium. I specifically enjoyed the sections called "Be Prolific" and "Learn to Recognize Patterns."
• Network effects (23:16) - in the product development world, this is a term that refers to features that incrementally get better (or provide greater value) the more they're used. If you're working on a product, this is a must-know concept. Here's the perfect resource to learn all about network effects (check out the slide deck at the bottom).

It's with tons of love that I ask you... if you find this interesting at all and want to support this project, please pass this along to a few friends. Thank you and enjoy!