The Leaderboard

Yesterday, Y Combinator-backed Proven launched on Product Hunt with a big mission — give people good skin for life. 🕺

At its core, Proven's skincare products — which includes a daily cleanser, anti-pollution lotion, and night cream — are powered by data. The company personalizes each customer's products by evaluating over 27 factors, from your genetic background to your lifestyle to the level of pollution where you live.

Some initial reactions from the Product Hunt community:

“No more off-the-shelf skincare that was made with scale and profit as the main focus. Everyone's skin and lifestyle is different, so why should our skincare be the same? I definitely recommend it.” - Tyrel

“It’s the smartest skin care line I’ve ever found. Combining data, science, lifestyle and environmental factors. It’s a must try.” - Tashie

“It may be time to stop sneaking in my wife's skincare.” - Che Yu

We've already seen similar skincare startups like Curology ($18.8M raised), Dear Brightly and Hello Ava dip into custom skincare, with health and beauty startups on the rise writ large. 💅

Last week, hair-customization startup Prose raised $18M in fresh funding ($25M raised total). Earlier this year, L’Oréal acquired AR beauty startup ModiFace in an attempt to reach younger audiences.

Tech giants like Google, Amazon and Facebook also want a piece of the beauty pie:

🔎 Google’s search data helps brands understand beauty shopper's preferences

🗣 Amazon's Echo Look went all in on the “check out my fashion selfie" concept

💸 Instagram is investing in its popularity as a platform for beauty by monetizing its platform

As beauty and health startups continue to take flight within the tech industry, it's likely we'll see things get even more *personal.*

“I truly believe that personalization will be the future of all of consumer goods, not just in personal care but all things that touch our every day lives, because once you try personalized products and experience personalized service, there's no going back. So this is just the happy beginning” - Proven cofounder Ming Zhao

Pro tip: Prove is offering a $25 discount to Product Hunters to try out its skincare.

The next-generation of AirPods is nigh. 🙏

At least that's what headlines indicated yesterday after top Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo updated his predictions for the wireless earbuds.

Kuo forecasted that the AirPod update will likely have “wireless charging support,” though it's not clear if that means to the AirPod case or the earbuds themselves. In other words, the update could be sold as an add-on accessory for people who already have AirPods.

AirPods are reportedly Apple's most popular accessory ever, and Kuo also predicted that Apple will go from selling 16 million units in 2017 to more than 100 million by 2021. 😳

A brief history

Apple introduced AirPods to the world alongside the release of the iPhone 7 in 2016.

Some initial reactions from the Product Hunt community:

“Instant bluetooth, light weight, no cords and a case that recharges means that you'll find yourself using the Airpods far more than normal wired headphones.” - Naval

“My immediate thought: I am going to lose these instantly.” - Holly

“I get more use out of these then any headphones I've owned prior. I use daily. Walk out the door with my keys, iPhone, wallet, pen, Airpods!” - Dave

Now, the earbuds are on track to become Apple's most popular accessory ever. In fact, existing iPhone owners are more likely to buy AirPods than upgrade their iPhone.

A ton of products have also come out of the weeds in response to the popular earpieces, from Retro AirPods to BlackPods to a leash for your AirPods.

Looking ahead

The new AirPods are likely to come out in the first quarter of 2019, with their main selling points being the wireless charging feature and Bluetooth spec upgrades.

However, we may see an even bigger AirPod upgrade in 2020, with an “all-new design model to boost replacement demand.”

Our first-ever Product Hunt Makers Festival has been a celebration of creativity with teams and individuals from all corners of the globe coming together to launch something. Our showcase last week had close to 100 projects across our six themes: social impact, remote workers, voice and audio, health and beauty, inclusion and brain stuff. Makers also built awesome products outside the six categories!

We were so impressed with all of the projects that came out of this year’s Makers Festival. In fact, we're already planning the next one 😏

So without further ado, here are our winners and the runners up in each category:

Social Impact 👊

Cultural Fit is a collaborative list of cultural traits that make you love your workplace

Runners Up

Firebusters is a tool that automatically reports fires (as small as a tree!) to pinpoint its exact location

The Incredible League of Makers is a community for people to build and launch things that solve the world's problems

Voice & Audio 🗣

What would you choose is an Alexa Skill for the Makers Festival

Runners Up

Shuffl.fm is a music assistant that uses hands-free playback and discovery

Voice Lightshow lets you ask Alexa to start a light show

Health & Beauty 💅

Lab Lyfe is an app that offers guided self-experiments in diet, wellness and lifestyle

Runners Up

Keepin' it feel is a reflection exercise is for understanding your emotions

Therma lets you track symptoms and medication for your loved ones

Inclusion 🌎

Femake provides lots and lots of data on female makers

Runners Up

YC Census is an incomplete census of Y-combinator startup batches

Handsfree.js is a drop-in library to create computer-vision powered handsfree interfaces for the web

Brain Stuff 🧠

Teeny Breaks is a Chrome extension showing you one mindfulness tip based on science every time you open a new tab

Runners Up

21 Days MVP provides a starter kit to create and validate your idea in 21 days or less

Paper List syncs your paper and electronic to-do lists

Remote Workers 💻

Yelling Across Cubicles is like walkie-talkie for remote teams

Runners Up

My Timezone Is makes it super easy to update and share your current timezone

IndieWorkspace shows you the desks of other indie makers

Other 🤷‍♂️

200 Words a Day wants to help anyone be a writer, 200 words at a time

Runners Up

Eureka is a web app that allows employees to put forward suggestions within their company

Stomp is a tool that helps you backup your email subscribers from email marketing platforms

Upvote Bell is a dashboard for your Product Hunt projects where you can see a chart with upvote stats

Congratulations to all and thank you to everyone who participated!

Anchor — the free podcast creation app — launched a new 'Sponsorships' marketplace yesterday to match podcasters with brand sponsors to help hosts make benjamins. 💰

Sponsorships is a natural next step for Anchor, and the latest in its effort to become a one stop shop for making podcasts.

“Before today, only 1% of podcasts were being monetized through ads due to a highly inefficient and closed off process. Anchor Sponsorships makes sponsorship monetization available to anyone (starting in the US), regardless of how many plays you get!” — Anchor co-founder Mike Mignano wrote on Product Hunt

The news follows Anchor's major revamp to its app last February, when the company shifted from a tool for short-form audio to an all-encompassing platform for podcasters to get their shows off the ground.

Anchor has raised $14.4M in funding to date from notable backers including Google Ventures, Accel, Betaworks and Homebrew, to name a few. The podcast industry is also on hockey stick trajectory. While it remains tiny compared to the radio, podcast revenues within the U.S. are projected to double year-over-year by the end of 2018 for the second year in a row.

If all this talk of making $$$ from podcasts has you plotting to make your own, here's some fresh podcast #content we're checking out:

🗒 Business Schooled is a new podcast hosted by Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian on Gen X and Baby Boomer entrepreneurs.

💁 Women Make Podcast puts women makers at the forefront of the show.

☝️ Company of One is a 10-episode podcast that explores a conversation around what happens if growth isn’t the byproduct of success.

😴 sleepyTimer lets you listen to your favorite podcasts or music before falling asleep.

👂Saycaster allows you to interact with specific moments in podcasts as you hear them.

Shameless plug: Product Hunt Radio is our weekly podcast where we talk with people creating and exploring the future. 😊

Let's talk about something no one wants to talk about: networking.

Yesterday, ex-Google and Twitter exec Karen Wickre's book Taking the Work out of Networking launched on Product Hunt to offer advice to all the introverts who panic at the idea of shaking hands and chitchatting with large groups of people.

Needless to say, the message resonated:

“My good friend Karen⁩ and I started at Google on the same day. I’ll never forget the warmth of her introduction. She’s been an invaluable friend, colleague, and advisor ever since. Whether you’re an introvert or not, be sure to read this book. (And yes, I am way more of an introvert than you would ever assume. Exhibit A: I live in the woods.)” — Chris Sacca

“As a bonafide introvert, this book is quickly becoming my bible. I've always avoided networking and probably missed out. Not anymore!” — Camille Ricketts

“I ordered on Kindle/Audible based on the recommendation, and was resold 3x over after reading the description on Amazon. Looks like there's super practical advice in there” — Niv Dror

Introverted, extroverted, ambiverted or whatever you are — networking is hard.

So we dug up a few networking resources on Product Hunt to help you out:

💌 Networking Emails is a collection of email templates that cover things like how to ask an industry leader for advice, how to cold email alumni or how to follow-up with someone you met at an event.

📱 Rive makes it super easy to send contact information when you meet a new person — it's basically a better alternative for giving someone your number.

💬 AimChat is an ambitious idea: The app lets you send a message to people within your sight with one chance to convince them that you are worth talking to.

👩‍💻 Bevy is an app specifically designed for women who want to help other women at any stage of their life.

👏 The 11 Laws of Likeability is another book for anyone who wants to build long-lasting professional relationships (by being likeable).

And if you’d like to meet and collaborate with other makers from home in your PJs, join us here.

Yesterday, the annual 2019 Breakout List launched on Product Hunt, naming the latest batch of “high potential and high growth” startups on a breakout trajectory.

The Breakout List was founded in 2014 to help tech workers vet companies for rocketship potential.

These startups usually have a solid VC backing, but the list is not scientific by any means. More often, companies that make the list are going after large markets and generating revenue fast.

“We help engineers, salespeople and other people in tech accelerate their learning and career trajectory. Investors know lots about the potential of a given startup - they’ve likely seen or been told their private financial metrics. Candidates deserve better information on companies. They’re betting their career,” Breakout List Maker Chris Barber wrote on Product Hunt.

Here's a breakdown of a few of the top startups:

📦 Flexport ($304M raised) is a freight forwarder that enables faster and cheaper shipping. Ultimately, Flexport is digitizing the entire international shipping process, allowing customers to do things like track the freight in their global supply chain in real-time.

🚘 Nuro ($92M raised) is building autonomous vehicles for last mile delivery. The company's technology aims to substantially reduce delivery prices using autonomous vehicles and has grown from 0 to more than 200 employees in two years.

🏠 Blend ($160M raised) was founded by a group of ex-Palantir employees and simplifies the mortgage application process for both borrowers and lenders. In the past year, the team's headcount grew from 270 to 400.

💌 Clearbit ($2M raised) makes business intelligence APIs — tools that help you learn things like who's behind an email address. The company was founded in 2014 and has since launched a Gmail widget to help you find anyone's email address, high-converting lead forms, and a tool to turn anonymous web traffic into data.

⚡️ Bolt wants to give retailers a better shot at competing with Amazon through a dead-simple checkout for customers. The company's team includes a handful of folks from Google, Facebook, Twitter and Airbnb, and grew from 15 to 60 in the past year. The company's funding is undisclosed but its backers include founders of PayPal, Intuit, Splunk, StubHub, and Oculus, to name a few.

💪 Airtable ($162M raised) is a productivity tool for teams that's part spreadsheet and part database. In March, the company announced a new apps platform that gives non-coders tools to build complex software. Airtable is also a sponsor of Product Hunt Radio. Coincidence??? 🤔😂

✨ Ubiquity6 ($37.5M) helps developers create augmented reality apps. The small team is engineering-heavy and “pre-breakout.” It launched out of stealth in August with fanfare, demonstrating a beta preview of its technology for the first time at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

💵 Atrium ($75.5M) is a “better law firm for startups.” It's really a low-cost legal option for young companies, with Justin Kan at the helm.

💸 Reserve aims to solve a major challenge with cryptocurrencies: price stability and actual functionality as transactional money. The company is backed by people like Peter Thiel and Sam Altman, and is currently in a “pre-breakout” phase.

🚙 Comma ($8.1M) is a self-driving car OS. The CEO is George Hotz, and the company is building technology in tandem with the autonomous vehicle industry.

Also on the list: Neuralink, Discord, Superhuman (get your invite here), Plaid, Notion, AngelList, and more.