Feedback helps us direct our actions and creations - even our writing. To use feedback effectively, you need specific feedback. How do you get specific feedback?

Feedback First

Purposeful Practice is how you build a skill. It involves having specific goals, focussed attention, immediate feedback and moving out of your comfort zone. Applying the principles of purposeful practice to products, you get purposeful products.

Purposeful Product

NFTs are a foundational technology for the next generation of Internet. They enable ownership of digital content. For the first couple of decades of Internet, ownership has been overlooked.

What's a NFT

By bringing decentralization, token economics, ownership and new ways of identity to the Internet, web3 will have a significant impact on the products we use.

How Web3 Will Help Make Better Products

People love dark mode. That doesn't mean they should be forced to use it. It should be a choice they make. At the system level.

Respect The Theme

Though NFTs sell for millions, the most satisfying ones are the ones you earn. Buildspace helped me earn a splendid NFT while teaching me the basics of Solana development.

Learn and Earn Buildspace Solana NFT

Decentralized Finance (DeFi) lets you be your own bank. It can help you earn better interest rates, transfer funds internationally quickly and with minimal fees, exchange cryptocurrencies and so much more.

Introduction to DeFi on Solana

I invested in Bitcoin, Ethereum before they blew up this year but this course is my best investment yet. If you are anyone who uses written form of communication, this course has something in it for you.

Why Shaan's Power Writing Course is my best investment of 2021

Cloud software pricing has one significant problem for the user. The moment they stop paying, they lose access to the software.

Solving the Subscription Problem

Why should you build your own blog when there are many blogging platforms already - WordPress, Ghost, Medium, etc? And how to do it

Why & How to Build Your Own Blog

Blockchain is a chain of blocks containing information. What makes it exciting? Trust. Being distributed & immutable, blockchains maintain truth without a central authority

What is Blockchain & Why is it exciting

Choosing an authentication system for your app is like choosing a door for your house. While it stands out for a moment, people will immediately forget it if the experience is good. Yet, if the experience is bad, people will remember.

How to Choose Authentication System for your App

Whatsapp's success is no accident. Their relentless focus on core product features, right strategy and other factors ensured that billions of people use WhatsApp on a regular basis.

Product Decisions that worked for WhatsApp

Build for a specific audience. Involve users early. Keep the scope small & ship often. Be great at what makes your product different.

Lessons learnt from building Newslettrs

Amazon's order emails used to be useful. Now, they just show the order number and nothing about what's in the order. Why is that?

Amazon's Order Emails Detailed

TV Apps can be better and they ought to be. They aren't optimized for the big screen and watching experience. I assume less than 10% time on TV is spent on the interface but that contributes significantly to the overall experience. Simple considerations can go a long way.

Make TV Apps Usable

Note taking apps solve one problem but introduce another. They solve the taking notes part but create the problem of 1000 notes not being used. It's like the Pocket of your thoughts and ideas. You want to get back to them, but you don't.

The Problem With Note-Taking Apps

Good products are everywhere. What makes a product good? They are useful, intentional, iterative and focused.

Philosophy of a Good Product

It's time to build. It's also time to build an audience. Even if just 0.001% of the people on the Internet are interested in your content, it means you have an audience of 4000000 and that is quite something.

Start Building an Audience

Everyone uses Twitter for their own reasons. I used it for entertainment. Now, I have made it useful. Twitter is a great place to find people who inspire you. You can learn a lot, if you follow the right people. Who you follow on Twitter makes or breaks your experience. Follow wisely.

How I Made Twitter Feed Useful for Me

Welcome to my blog again. Thank you for your attention. My name is Monish Kumar. I explore the Solana blockchain and write (tweet & blog) about it.

Welcome Back

Check out how Apple Watch stand notifications, Google Photos sync, Google Maps Direction and TweetBot Add Image microinteractions work.

Microinteractions - A Series: Part 2

Ever since I read Dan Saffer’s Microinteractions, I developed a big interest in the little details. Everyday, we interact with a lot of apps and websites — some of those interactions are good and some bad.

Microinteractions - A Series: Part 1

Facebook turned its “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” motto to “If you can’t join ’em, clone ‘em. Facebook’s fight to stay relevant isn’t against Snapchat alone.

The Copy Nemesis

Back in May 2010, I joined Twitter as an user during my undergraduate studies. I did not understand what Twitter was for and why I had to use the service. I neither understood the concept of #hashtags nor @mentions. I would Tweet random things only to be ignored and left unnoticed.

A Small User Research on Twitter Problems

Before the end of January 2016, four of Twitter’s top executives left the company. One of them went to work for Instagram(a competitor) and one of them to Google. What happens now?

Twitter - Ten, Beyond and the Future

On February 24th 2016, Facebook changed one of the fundamental ways we interact with content on Facebook — Facebook introduced Reactions as an extension of the “Like” feature and as an ability for us to more than just “Like” a post.

My Thoughts on Facebook Reactions

Homes are about to get smarter in the future and you may be able to control your house with just your voice like how Tony Stark did it in Iron Man via his personal assistant Jarvis.

Design Process - SmartHome

It is complicated to follow fashion brands, get their latest products and be able to buy it from a single place.

Design Process - Zetsy

Managing times with different people is the main problem during carpooling. People inform other carpool people that they are running late only at the last moment making others wait without any prior information.

Design Process - SharpRide

Sharing useful local information with people is complicated. Local information is not shared on the Internet, but spread just through word of mouth among friends. There isn’t a singular platform to get the tips, life hacks and deals in a locality.

Design Process - TwoCents

Yahoo started out as a hierarchal directory of other websites while Google started out as a search engine(ranking the websites based on a number of factors). Right from the beginning Yahoo was focussed on filling its webpage with content leaving little white space while Google was happy having a lot of white space on its homepage.

Google vs Yahoo - How the Homepage Evolved

TVs aren’t getting smart, they are getting thinner and high resolution while peripherals(like gaming consoles and streaming devices) are trying to make the TVs smarter.

Monish Kumar

Monish Kumar

I design simple & effective user interfaces by understanding users & their goals.

How Web3 Will Help Make Better Products

Respect The Theme