Artisans: Taste In Software
Opinionated SaaS and abstracting software away
Hey friends! I’m Akash, an early stage technology investor.
I enjoy learning about how great companies are built and aim to share those learnings on startup strategy with founders & operators. You can always reach me at akash@earlybird.com to exchange notes and share feedback.
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About ten months ago, Rick Rubin, author of 'The Creative Act’, became the subject of widespread satire for his comments on his skills as a music producer:
‘Do you play instruments?
Barely
Do you know how to work a soundboard?
No. I have no technical ability, and I know nothing about music.
You must know something.
Well I know what I like and what I don’t like.. and I’m decisive about what I like and what I don’t like.
So what are you being paid for?
The confidence I have in my taste and my ability to express what I feel, has proven helpful for artists.’
I was reminded of Rubin’s comments as I read
’s interview with Karri Saarinen, co-founder and CEO of Linear.Karri and Linear eschew conventional wisdom on the efficacy of A/B tests in product development and instead hone taste and intentionality to develop software:
We validate ideas and assumptions that are driven by taste and opinions, rather than the other way around where tests drive decisions.
has a wonderful essay on the rise of ‘Artisan SaaS’, companies that are crafting premium experiences for digital utilities like email, calendar, contacts, browser, etc.‘We as an industry optimized the process too much and created a Henry Ford–style feature factory where each role is very specific and production speed is more important than craft. (The other reason is A/B testing.)’
The world was hungry for premium experiences but anyone who had tried before had been crushed. We wanted blazing fast interactions that empower you to work at the speed of thought. We wanted custom workflows for us power users to help us build systems on top of the base functionality. We wanted a brand that made us feel something when we logged in instead of spending our days staring a the digital equivalent of a cubical.
Artisan software may well deliver blazing speed, opinionated workflows, and a visceral brand, but the wholesale reinvention of experiences is its crowning achievement.
To do so, artisans listen closely to customers’ problems but actualise their own solutions and practice their faith..
Great founders understand when something is ready for others to consume.
Superhuman built product for three years before putting the product in the hands of customers (at which point they also began their now well known onboarding process). Rahul Vohra has often discussed the pressures he felt to launch a minimum viable product and how he relented as an artisan turning a utility into a premium experience with maximum delight:
Patrick O’Shaughnessy: One of my favorite debates in the world of technology entrepreneurship is the debate between sort of the lean model, where you're iterating and failing a lot and learning through customer feedback, and what I'll call the Keith Rabois movie production model, where it more sounds like what you've done, which is big long effort that is almost produced like a movie would be, with actors and a script and everything else, and you go to market with an incredible product, not one that's sort of been iterated through a crowd.
Rahul Vohra: I'm actually a big believer in both, and I would say we sit somewhere in the middle. I would say, raise a tremendous amount of capital up front. I would say, take your decisions as long term as you can. I would say, don't put out a minimum viable product, put out a maximally delightful product.
Opinionated software melds customer pain with taste to derive premium experiences, neutralising skeuomorphism.
When you test your product out with people, listen to their problems. Learn everything you can from them. When you deeply understand their pain, you can then come up with solutions they might not be able to see.
As a founder, you should spend significant time talking to customers. Hear their problems, but don’t solve for their solutions.
As AI democratise software creation, a world with a billion developers will not lack for builders as much as it will lack for artisans.
was prescient in January in his predictions for artisan software:Faster interaction speeds, keyboard shortcuts, and command pallets are all examples of the way software is getting out of our way and requiring less of our mental energy to complete a task.
Software is indeed getting out of our way, faster than ever.
Investors are clamouring for founders to reinvent extant UI/UX paradigms, compressing the steps required for humans to instruct computers. Multi-modal models and agents are building blocks for founders to build upon.
This week, Pika AI announced $55m in funding for its text-to-video platform for prosumers.
This is what magic feels like, in December 2023. Let’s see how this statement ages.
If the endgame is Neuralink transmissions to instruct computers, we’re progressing at a good clip.
In the interim, the collapse of barriers to software creation will make artisans’ stock appreciate further. Opinionated software is here to stay.
ServiceNow, Salesforce, Workday and other systems of record have large installed bases that are reluctant to shift to the public cloud, let alone undertake the change management of training employees on new UI/UX paradigms. The starting gun has been fired.
Reading List
GenAI and the Future of Financial Advice: More Co-Pilot Than Autopilot
B2B Marketing Budget Benchmarks
Purpose and Partnership Benchmark Capital on Invest Like The Best
Quote of the week
‘If you’re glued together and honorable and get up every morning and keep learning every day and you’re willing to go in for a lot of deferred gratification all your life, you’re going to succeed.’ Charlie Munger
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