Notion Is Changing… Here’s What To Expect In 2024

[@mfreihaendig]

This and future episodes will also be published as a podcast in case you prefer listening to it 💪🏻 Adding the links to different podcast platforms here (and will update as more are being added): Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/0tZQpM1DdbHe548BfVTvHt

[@ocristianoalmeida]

00:02 Notion's biggest challenge is building for non-work users. 02:37 Balancing creativity with competitiveness in professional life 07:36 Notion has the opportunity to compete on the main stage of the largest software market in history. 09:57 Product marketing involves diverse tasks and responsibilities. 14:36 Notion is used for project and task organization 16:50 Financial Bubbles and Trends 21:05 Transition from tech startup to wine brand entrepreneur. 23:23 Starting a small passion project with a friend 27:40 Notion aims to cater to businesses of all sizes as their primary productivity software. 29:30 Notion's power lies in knowledge management 33:44 Notion aims to consolidate AI tools into its workspace to prevent fragmentation issues 35:58 Notion focus is shifting to core knowledge features for better usability 40:07 Notion focuses on building useful features and empowering users to customize. 42:20 Notion empowers users to design and build their own systems 46:23 Notion may refocus on simplicity in 2024 48:21 Improving information organization and accessibility in Notion

[@mfreihaendig]

Thanks a lot for the summary! 😇

[@krystofekl8162]

Nice, I'll watch this soon! Before I do though, small point of feedback - there's no point in cutting to John's answers in the intro if you're just gonna beep them out, that's just annyoing. Either just say what's covered in the video without the clips of John, or don't do the beeps.

[@mfreihaendig]

Appreciate the feedback! It‘s the first interview ever on the channel, so I‘m still experimenting with the intro style. Saw a few interview channels where they do that on their episodes and I though it would be a great way to build up anticipation - trying to help you decide whether the full 50 min are worth it 😅 But I see what you mean - I’ll experiment a bit with other styles in the future!

[@krystofekl8162]

@@mfreihaendig Yeah, it's a good idea! I just don't think it really works in this form. Perhaps you could try finding different clips for this purpose though, for example if the guest says something like "We're gonna build everyone's mind with this" - something that still builds the anticipation without giving any secrets away (and thus without the need to beep anything out). And as for committing to 50 minutes, have you considered publishing the interviews in podcast form as well? I assume most of the time it would be enough to listen to them, and that's definitely easier for me to do than watch something. But good job, keep it up!

[@mfreihaendig]

@@krystofekl8162 yes, that would be ideal! Unfortunately didn't have the proper audio clips to do this here 😅 And yes, I'll publish these as podcasts as well! It's all still a super rough draft, but you can already check it out on spotify here: open.spotify.com/show/0tZQpM1DdbHe548BfVTvHt I'll add more links to other platforms as I submit the podcast 😇

[@krystofekl8162]

@@mfreihaendig Great! Unfortunately the link doesn't seem to be working, but I'll be looking forward to that :) Also, I realised that the beeps might be annoying, but that doesn't necessarily mean they didn't successfully build anticipation in me, so I guess you're right to keep experimenting :) I sincerely hope that data actually proves my annoyance right though :D And to answer the question you posed elsewhere here - I think both the Modern Wisdom and Huberman Lab podcasts do the intros pretty well. That said, I think by far the most important anticipation builder is the title of the video, and the one you used here works great :)

[@mfreihaendig]

@@krystofekl8162 thanks, appreciate it! 😇 Least I can do is make it much quicker so that it's less annoyance to sit through - but I'll also see whether I can then find some alternatives. Great examples you shared there, I'll check them out in more detail! Anything else you'd like to see in future interviews?

[@blazekwaymullina2392]

agreed with comments on bleeping. Super annoying and has the literal opposite effect of why you trying to use it. At first glace you just assume he is swearing his head off and you bleeped it so that you didnt get booted on some youtube profanity algorythym. Just do the intro youself and leave some mystery to dangle the carrot.

[@mfreihaendig]

Appreciate the feedback! Took that to heart and did a different intro for the second interview here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/aqfMoahug81neNE What do you think of that? ☺️

[@Visual_Notes]

Very interesting to hear all this, especially from a Notion team member who operates at such a high level, but also somehow strange when I think that it is currently not even possible to view or open an embedded PDF on Notion Mobile.

[@mfreihaendig]

Yeah PDF just isn’t very well supported right now - but looks like we‘ll get some changes here! ☺️

[@Federaik]

Doh! In my perspective you missed an important question: is some feature similar to Obsidian Canvas or any form of visual graphing capability coming anytime soon?! 😅

[@mfreihaendig]

Oh that would have been a great one! I‘ll ask it in the next interview - got a few more lined up 😎 Anything else I should ask? ☺️

[@mostlynotworking4112]

@@mfreihaendigI second the question since Notion and obsidian are still my two main

[@seanmartinflix]

Yes yes

[@Smaffs59]

Hopefully they will integrate the Skiff email product they recently purchased.

[@mfreihaendig]

That would be really cool!

[@blazekwaymullina2392]

it would be great see notion add some basics like forms and some actual inbuilt visualisations.

[@mfreihaendig]

Oh yes that would be amazing! 😍

[@pbooth88]

What's the point of the bleep bits at the start! If you are going to edit the sound out why waste peoples time with putting the video clips in in the first place.

[@mfreihaendig]

It’s an experiment! First interview I‘ve done on the channel and it’s an intro style that I‘ve seen on a few bigger channels 💪🏻 Idea behind is to show what you can expect from the rest of the video without giving too much away - just like a trailer for a movie. Appreciate your feedback though that you’re not a fan of this. I‘ll keep it in mind while I experiment with different ways to make these interviews entertaining 💪🏻

[@mfreihaendig]

I went in and reduced the beeps in the beginning as much as possible based on what youtube lets you do after an interview - hope it's better now and I'll keep it in mind for future interviews 💪🏻

[@NicholasMcGill]

The first 3/4 of the video have NOTHING to do with the title... For those who want the TLDR, Future release of Notion include a space to upload and edit PDFs, or have AI edit it, or have AI learn the PDFs! No offline mode apparently.

[@mfreihaendig]

Sorry to hear you feel that way but I‘d disagree - knowing who Notion currently views as their target audience and a refocus on specific use cases seem highly relevant to me 😎

[@VitaminB3TA]

Great interview! 🙌🏻

[@mfreihaendig]

Thanks! Anything you‘d love to see in future editions?

[@Notion688]

Thank you Matthias for good interview

[@mfreihaendig]

Thanks, really appreciate it! ☺️ I‘m looking to do more of those in the future - anything in particular that you‘d love to see?

[@darrylbrooks3361]

"ability to take a PDF all your PDFs upload them in the notion create a page" This should have been done years ago. PDFs in Notion are still a train wreck. The import PDF is a joke. Embedding only works half the time and never translates to mobile. So "the ability to find content in Notion wherever you are doesn't work today if that content is in a PDF. Notion is the only software of its type that can't figure out how to handle PDFs. I hope that changes in 2024, otherwise, I have to stick with Evernote.

[@mfreihaendig]

It’s definitely a weak spot! Overall, Notion isn’t made to handle file storage. It’s great at organising your knowledge that’s directly in there - or you need to utilise something like drive as the storage and then Notion simply as the hub. But fully agree with you, I very much hope that they improve this experience soon 😇

[@darrylbrooks3361]

@@mfreihaendig This is why I have finally come around to not trying to do everything with one tool. Evernote is my storage and retrieval database while Notion handles the every day and mobile needs. Thanks for your videos.

[@rudolfnn]

To John Hurley: Backlinks 2.0 🙏 (show sentences/context around backlinks, “networked notes” to include linked and unlinked mentions or references)

[@mfreihaendig]

Oh that’s a great one, I‘ll pass that on to the team 😇🙏🏻

[@0013paul]

I think the intro is terrible. I wanted to listen to this interview but the beeps and bait stuff was done so horribly that made me angry. I know you can catch the audience in the first seconds, but make it fast, dynamic and short.

[@mfreihaendig]

Sorry to hear that! It’s the first time I‘m doing an interview on the channel, so I appreciate the feedback. Will look to make future intros less annoying while still trying to make it interesting to watch the rest. Do you happen to have any examples of great intros you enjoyed? ☺️

[@mfreihaendig]

@0013paul, I went in and reduced the beeps in the beginning as much as possible based on what youtube lets you do after an interview - hope it's better now and I'll keep it in mind for future interviews 💪🏻

[@JonMichaelDeBona]

Yeah, love your videos. Don't ruin them like this. Came really close to just moving on.

[@mfreihaendig]

@@JonMichaelDeBona appreciate it! It’s hopefully much better on the second interview, have you checked that one out?

[@SiggiundHarry1]

I wish I could use Notion AI to condense this video into the most crucial five to ten minutes. A fifty-minute speech? Are you serious? 😆Bla Bla Bla

[@mfreihaendig]

Haha that’s what interviews and podcasts sometimes tend to 😅 I hope you have it set to 2x speed! Oh and by the way, you can! I have the full transcript of the episode on the blog (link in the description) so you can go ahead and add it to Notion for a summary 😇 But if this feedback comes more often, then I‘ll include a shortened summary in future episodes 💪🏻

[@paris.granville]

Beeping super annoying.

[@mfreihaendig]

Thanks for the feedback - that was an experiment ☺️ Will explore different ways to create an interesting intro in the future!

[@Renee_egan]

Oh my god Goosebumps 😂🙌🏽 what was the authors name omg thats going to bug me Please tell me they're addressing the ai

[@mfreihaendig]

Which author do you mean? 😇 glad to hear you liked it! 😍

[@PrzemekKocur]

Creating, finding and systemizing content - this is the main idea I bring out after listening to the podcast. Plus: reading and retrieving info from PDFs (Evernote has had it for years). No info on Home being delivered to all the users and mobile, no info on developing project and task management functions, nothing about Notion calendar availability on Android and offline mode (of course!) - I feel very disappointed with this interview. It brought nothing new and exciting for me, maybe it did for others. If this is what Notion has in store for 2024 - it's a big disappointment. :(

[@mfreihaendig]

Hm fair point if you‘re disappointed, but I think it’s also really interesting to hear that they’ll focus more strongly on knowledge management, a deeper AI integration and trying to make the app more accessible to a larger user base. I‘m sure that’s not all they ship in 2024, but as an overall direction, I‘m excited to see where this goes! What would be the most pressing other issue you‘d love to see resolved?

[@PrzemekKocur]

@@mfreihaendig You are right, they have their strategy and no wonder they look rather at the enterprise client, not individuals. I guess they know better the expectations of this type of client so they focus on some functions like knowledge management system supported by AI. For me, task management (TM) is also important. I thought they wanted to be all-in-one app. It looks like they try to implement more functions and make it more like a real TM system - look at Home on desktop. But the month has passed and it has not yet been made available to all users. For me it's misleading when they inform about it on their website. It should be noted that it's available only for some. Then: Home on mobile. Guys! A lot of people do things using their mobiles. I can't understand this! How am I supposed to use the app if I have to handle things differently on desktop and mobile?! Maybe the problem is that there is already a Home button on mobile, showing all the workspaces and teamspaces? If this is the case, what's the problem in giving it a different name? Of course, to have real task management system on mobile, it has to be structured differently, now it's just a combination of databases views. In fact, such a structured view already exists, but it's not reachable directly. Look at this: drive.google.com/file/d/1Bq8MQPBM4SPv-ONd1ONIs4WbIC9o-YGk/view?usp=sharing Or maybe, they changed their mind and now want the Notion Calendar to be their task and project management app? If so, why isn't it still available on Android? I remember Cron has already stated that they were working on it - more than a year ago. Sorry, for this long comment, I just wanted to make myself clear and present a view of an individual user who want to make Notion their all-in-one app. I use it literally for everything, handling all thing home, health, travel, work, study, finances etc. etc. It's a great app, I am just not sure if this is still an app I thought it would become for me. By the way, I love your posts on Twitter and your videos, they are very informative, everything is clearly explained, showing practical ways of using Notion. Keep up the good work! Love.

[@rudolfnn]

I've transcribed and summarized the interview, which you can find over on the Notion subreddit. 📃

[@mfreihaendig]

Oh amazing, thank you so much!