Head of Product Strategy at 37signals, makers of Basecamp, HEY, and Fizzy. Writing on product at https://nitter.cf/t.co/2YpnjlSb9J
Northampton, MA
Joined November 2006
- Tweets14.1K
- Following58
- Followers3.8K
- Likes2.6K
I'm thrilled that Lexxy became a reality, and that we pushed past the thousands of reasons not to take it on. There are always more pressing things than making a new text editor! But it's been so worth it. And it's constantly improving.
Big thanks to @jorgemanru for taking a week to prove that it was possible. And that was back when we chiseled code by hand around a campfire 😂
Lexxy 1.0 is here, and we are going to make it the Rails default.
Lexxy answers a question we’ve been wrestling with at @37signals for years: what should we do with such a critical component of our apps? For a long time, we didn't see a clear path, but now it is here, and it is better than we anticipated. That makes this project especially meaningful to me.
Kudos to @bb for pushing for it, to @zoltanhosszu and Sam Péchèr for making it very real, and to the many other folks who have contributed so far.
dev.37signals.com/lexxy-1-0
An Ode to Summer Hours world.hey.com/bb/summer-hour…
We work four days a week during the summer. But it’s not just that summer is better, it’s that fall is, too. The shift back to normal weeks makes it feel new and different.
Think of it like intervals when you’re working out. You can go further because you're not just pushing through at the exact same pace indefinitely.
We’re living through the big blur. Product, design, engineering, mobile, web, QA. Roles are fluid. Previously clear lines now fade at the edges like lines in an Agnes Martin painting.
Will new lines be drawn or will they all just fade away?
world.hey.com/bb/the-big-blu…
Finally got to see LCD Soundsystem in person this weekend and it was incredible — the lights, the sound, the crowd. Watching 8 people meticulously recreate electronic music live was mesmerizing.
Omarchy isn't just for developers. If you’re curious, and miss the freedom and fun that come with making your computer work just the way you want, give Omarchy a go. Here's how my first week went...
world.hey.com/bb/my-first-we…
Small shifts in how we think about cool-down between cycles in Shape Up...
world.hey.com/bb/tune-up-d6c…
We spent a year building Basecamp 5, which launched last week. One phrase kept coming back to me throughout: Don't accept the premise.
But that may have also been because I was watching Taskmaster 😄
world.hey.com/bb/don-t-accep…
Quite a week! @Arsenal win the Premier League for the first time in 22 years, @nyknicks reach the finals for the first time in 19 years, and after a week together in Copenhagen, we launched Basecamp 5, the best version in its 22-year history. Take a look: basecamp.com
I've yet to come across two words in product development that make me cringe more than "backlog grooming".
Working on Basecamp 5 and hit a bug. Deleting one weekly meeting deleted all future ones, too.
Or is it? If Fizzy has an entropy feature that cleans up inactive cards automatically, maybe Basecamp should cancel recurring meetings after 3 months to see if anyone misses them. 🙂
A lovely essay, very much in the spirit of a past project, Uncommon in Common.
"I know how this is supposed to end. I'm supposed to tell you to simplify. Audit your subscriptions. Curate your devices. Own less.
I'm not going to do that."
terrygodier.com/the-last-qui…
"Coding agents dramatically drop the cost of typing code into the computer, which disrupts so many of our existing personal and organizational intuitions about which trade-offs make sense."
We're learning on the fly what the new trade-offs are.
simonwillison.net/guides/age…
This from @davidcrawshaw perfectly captures where things are rapidly heading.
"I implemented that entire Stripe product (as it relates to me) by typing three sentences. It solves my problem better than their product."
Via @simonw
crawshaw.io/blog/eight-more-…
Great post from @om
"This new power should turbocharge our capabilities. And in order for that, it has to live inside the tools we already use. Smaller, focused, embedded."
om.co/2026/02/06/how-ai-goes…
This is a great look at Fizzy, plus an interview with @jasonfried.
"I was struck by the presence of a distinctive design and sense of whimsy that’s largely faded from the greater software universe."
fastcompany.com/91470191/fiz…
A new episode of Recordables is here! Beyond the technical insight, it's filled with lessons about how to approach massive projects like this and the human side of dealing with risks and unknowns. Highly recommended!
Ever wondered how you move 10 petabytes and billions of files off S3 without a second of downtime? @bitsweat explains:
dev.37signals.com/moving-mou…
Jeremy is probably the best programmer I know. We often joke about how he knows everything about everything computer-related (and this is pre-AI 😂). You should listen.
The big surprise in my Albums app 2025 wrap-up is that there were 49 days when I didn't use it. It lets me curate my music library as obsessively as I like and then tell my friends all about it repeatedly. That it's built by a single developer is madness! albumstheapp.com
