Points: 3

# Comments: 4

Unusual opinion alert: We think the future of chat starts with a better GIF camera. What we’ve built so far is basically like GIPHY or TENOR but all the GIFs are you and your friends. Not to flex, but it’s really fun to use. Just wrapped building the beta.

When you’re close with a group of people, you mimic each other: use similar words, slang, gestures, opinions. What we’re trying to do is build shared visual language. Instead of sending a emoji, send a GIF of yourself or a friend doing a party dance. Instead of sending a gif of Shaq doing a shimmy dance, make your own. Instagram filters made everyday people feel like their photos were good enough to share. We’ll make people feel like their gifs are expressive enough to share. You have to try it. It feels nonobvious until you try it. It’s not quite there yet but we’re not far off.

I’m a product designer…. Up until two weeks ago I freelanced designing the first versions of things for YC teams. (Warmly S20, Virtually S20, Zaam W20, Zippi S19). In prior lives built stuff for Intel, Intuit and Intercom.

I’m working with a crazy talented engineer (built Safari for the original iPhone launch) doing it for the cause but he has a family and won’t want to do this for more than a few months.

From a technology perspective we’re doing a lot of stuff with images and video, plus generalist “let’s move fast and learn” things. Over time we’ll invest in letting people deepfake themselves to make gifs and memes based on what is trending in their interest graph and the people we’re talking to.

This is gonna be a slog. We’re going to have to do the best work of our careers to have a shadow of a chance. This is a big bet. If we do it right, we have a chance to build the way everyone talks to each other.

Email me! I’m weird, often in useful ways. What the hell: maybe we’ll change the world.

brendanDmcdonald@gmail.com

About 30 HN community members have signed so far. Post your projects and ideas and email/chat/Zoom with the people you find interesting.

I'm putting it behind a form so that recruiters don't jump on and spam message everyone. Keep building + stay safe y'all!

What I want to see is a user navigating rooms herself. The interactions I imagine are pretty different even though the functionality is superficially similar. This is early, I'm sure my thinking will change a lot. Thanks for the link though!

Want to post below what you're working on and ask for the help you need? This is about finding collaborators/cofounders, not jobs/employees.

I'm also starting a list of people who are working on new things & want collaborators/cofounders, or people who are ready to build but are casting about for what to work on. Post your projects and ideas and email/chat/Zoom with the people you find interesting.

I'm putting it behind a form so that recruiters don't jump on and spam message everyone. If you wanna get on the list, sign up here: https://bmac-design.typeform.com/to/RbA4JL

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23172959

Points: 53

# Comments: 42

I’m extremely interested in the idea that a society has incentivized both a robust free press and accountability to speak the truth...

If that is the case it seems like those lessons would be very useful to democracies the world over.