The Roundup

Raise your hand if you're terrible at remembering passwords. ✋

Good news. Last week, the World Wide Web Consortium approved WebAuthn, a new authentication standard for password-free logins.

How it works: WebAuthn is an API that lets websites communicate with security devices, and allows users to log into their online accounts using biometrics and authentication hardware like FIDO security keys.

WebAuthn is already supported by browsers like Chrome, Firefox, Edge and Safari. Android and Windows 10 also support the new standard.

The next step for WebAuthn? Websites need to integrate the standard. Dropbox, Facebook, GitHub, Salesforce, Stripe and Twitter are already on board.

Why this is important: WebAuthn is more secure than the weak passwords that a lot of people use to safeguard their online accounts. Three out of four people use duplicate passwords online, and 21 percent of people use passwords that are over 10 years old. 😳

What does this mean for password managers like 1Password, PadLock, Dashlane, Google Titan and Blockvault? Time will tell. But not having a password at all is simpler than having to remember any password in the first place. 🔒

There's a new wild west in tech: foldable smartphones. 

Samsung officially unveiled its “Galaxy Fold” at Mobile World Congress after teasing the new technology back in November. The Galaxy Fold folds like a book, with a large screen on the inside protected by an outer cover — which also has a screen on it. And this new tech comes with a hefty price tag: $1,980 to be exact. 😐

Now, the Galaxy Fold is already facing some competition. Huawei launched its own foldable smartphone, dubbed the “Mate X” at Mobile World Congress as well. The Mate X folds depending on how you hold the phone, using one screen on the outside in three different ways. Compared to the Galaxy Fold, its screen is bigger, it folds flatter and it's thinner overall. But it'll run you $2,600. 😳

Foldable phone hype doesn't stop there! LG also launched its own version of a foldable device, but it's really just a phone that has a second screen. 

We know what you're thinking — is there going to be a foldable iPhone? Maybe. Apple hasn't joined the foldable phone race just yet, but it's been reported that Apple may be working on a foldable iPhone that could launch in 2020. 🔮

If you’re not a fan of this foldable trend and miss Snake, pickup this Nokia classic.

Last week, Webflow launched a new tool called 'Webflow Ecommerce' — an entirely visual platform for building and launching online stores. The tool is a direct competitor with Shopify, the current leader in an easy-to-use solutions for digital stores. 

But here's Webflow's edge: It's code-free.

Y Combinator graduate, Webflow, has been around since 2013 — it's a an all-in-one web design/CMS/hosting platform. And users love it.

“This is an *amazing* tool. I've done front-end web dev for a decade and I would rather build sites using this tool.” - Sameer, 2013 

“Webflow is such a powerful tool for Makers.” - Julie, last week 

And here's why Webflow Ecommerce could take market share away from Shopify: Makers want flexible, customizable, powerful, code-free tools. It's another example of the rise of rise of “no code.” 

This month alone, we've seen these code-free products launch:

🚀 Actiondesk is a Google Sheets/Zapier hybrid
🚀 Glide lets you create mobile apps from Google Sheets
🚀 Tinybot helps you create powerful Twitter bots without code 
🚀 Sheety turns Google Sheets into an API
🚀 Look Mom No Code gives you no-code templates for your next startup

Note: Shopify’s not doing so bad themselves:

So we're eager to watch how no-code unfolds in the land of ecommerce. 👀

Instagram is reportedly testing a web version of DMs. This means you can get the thrill of a notification in your Insta inbox even when you're not on your phone.

*gasps* 

Could Instagram turn into full-blown SMS? Maybe. But this possible new feature is really part of a larger shift we're seeing away from mindless scrolling and towards private, group-oriented messaging. 

We already know Facebook is leanin' into private messaging. Last week the company announced that it plans to unify the backend infrastructure for its messaging suite — WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger — and allow cross-app chat. Facebook also added new management tools and features for groups last week, which includes things like a mentorship feature, formatting for posts and bulleted lists. 

And it makes sense. More people reportedly use messaging platforms (4.1B in 2018 across the top 4 messaging apps) than social networks (roughly 3.4B social media MAUs worldwide). Marketers are also taking notice — Giphy CEO Alex Chung has publicly said he thinks brands should advertise in private messages. 

So as people shift away from broadcast (RIP The Feed) — where will online communities gather? 

We have some ideas (besides Instagram, Facebook, What'sApp, Snap and Twitter): 

Telegram is secure, simple instant messaging 💬

Signal is a mobile app for highly secure end-to-end messaging 🔒

Discord is a voice and text chat app designed specifically for gamers 🎮

October is a visual and pseudonymous social network 🙈

Duoshan (created by ByteDance) is an ephemeral video chat app 📹

Squad lets you screen share with friends from a group video chat 👥

Mighty Networks is a platform for people to gather around niche interests 🙌

Islands is Slack for college 🌴

NextDoor is a social app that lets you connect with your neighbors 🏠

Peach lets you share what you feel, think, see and hear with friends. Yes, it's still alive! 🍑

A particular “Newsletter Guide” launched on Product Hunt recently and caught our eye. Yes, this newsletter is about to get very meta. 

The Newsletter Guide is a collaboration between email gurus Yellow Brim, The Shorenstein Center and Lenfest Institute. It's not an intro-level newsletter course, but more of a “201”-level toolkit of resources, strategies and open-source templates for people who run newsletters to collaborate on. 

The idea behind the project is to reduce the technical strain behind making a newsletter, and allowing editors to focus more on editorial. Some things the Newsletter Guide covers:

• How to grow your email list
• How to monetize your newsletter
• How to evaluate success metrics
• How to track where subscribers found you
• How to avoid accidentally breaking laws

And soooo much more. 

The Newsletter Guide comes alongside an uptick in products that make it superrr easy for people to launch newsletters without much hassle. Here are a few: 

💌 Substack gives writers a CMS built for publishing paid newsletters 

💌 Revue helps you quickly spin up a personal newsletter

💌 Email Newsletter Checklist helps you send error-free emails 

💌 Good Bits lets you create newsletters from the best links on the web

💌 Send Check It helps you write better email subjects

💌 EmailDrips is like Dribbble for email drip campaigns

PSA: The milkman is making a comeback. 🥛

But instead of fresh milk, he'll be serving up deodorant, mouthwash, ice cream, shampoo, etc. in reusable containers — and then circling back to pick them up when you're done. 

Last week, a solid lineup of big-name consumer brands — Procter & Gamble, Nestlé, PepsiCo, Unilever and Danone — banded together to pilot a new reusable packaging subscription service called Loop. The mission? Phase out single-use plastics. 

How it works: Like with Amazon, you create an account online, add items to a virtual basket and checkout. But on top of payment for your items you'll pay a fully refundable deposit for each package too (which will range from $1 to $10). Then, your items will be delivered in a tote bag, which a delivery person will come back later to retrieve with your used packaging. The packaging is then sent to a cleaning facility and recycled for another customer. ♻️

Some reactions on Product Hunt: 

“Prediction time: Amazon will buy them or recreate if it's mildly popular.” - Antoine 

“I could easily see this having some kind of discount for reusing the same containers” - Alex 

“With all the deliveries we get from online shopping these days, packaging is getting ridiculously wasteful. This is a brilliant solution” - Tim 

The subscription system will start out in New York and Paris later this year, but if you don't live in one of those cities you can still join the #zerowaste movement. Here's few suggestions: 

Get JUST Water (backed by Will Smith!). It's a paper-based bottle made from sugarcane with a 74% smaller carbon footprint than standard plastic bottles. 💦

Eliminate your cup altogether with GO Cubes. It's chewable coffee. ☕️

Buy eco-friendly sunglasses like Joplins. They're made from bamboo fibers — which are 100% sustainable. 😎

Use Moo's recycled business cards made from cotton t-shirts. ♻️

Avoid plastic straws with ELO's reusable smart straw. 🥤

Last week, a new startup called One Health made headlines with a fresh $5 million seed round from Andreessen Horowitz, Lerer Hippeau and Y Combinator. Contrary to what its name might suggest, One Health is not just another healthcare startup. Its mission is to help your dog fight cancer. 🐶

Brandless also had some pet-related news last week: the company is expanding beyond it's $3 price point to launch a line of dog (or cat!) Frisbees, collars and freeze-dried treats for $9. Pssst: They're competing with Amazon. 

Both announcements point to the fact that pet tech is booming. 

Need more evidence? BarkBox ($81.7M raised) reportedly delivers its pet-themed boxes to over 600,000 subscribers each month. And let's not forget that on-demand dog walking service Wag raised $300 million from SoftBank last year. Shortly after that, Wag's biggest competitor — Rover — raised a $155 million round ($310.9M total) . 

Basically, when it comes to our beloved furry friends, the potential to make $$$ is high.

What else will pet owners pay for? 

🐾 Custom socks with prints of your dog 

🛏 Casper dog beds 

🍗 A pet meal subscription service that delivers fresh food 

🐩 Dog collars and leashes that are easy to clean 

😁 Chew toys to help your dog brush its teeth 

🐕 Handmade stuffed copies of your pet

Not a pet owner? Maybe forward this email to your doggo-obsessed friend.

Last week, Wordpress's parent company Automattic launched Newspack, a new publishing platform tailor-made for local newsrooms. And its backed by $2.4M in funding led by Google. 

How it works: Newspack will operate as a secure, inexpensive toolkit for small to medium-sized newsrooms that will make their technical decisions easier. It will definitely support existing Wordpress plugins and *maybe* include website design, commerce options or CMS configuration. 

“Sounds, essentially, like a sponsored/subsidized, hosted, distribution of WordPress” - Chris Messina

Interestingly, Facebook had a similar announcement last week too. 🤔

The tech giant announced a $300M (!) investment in local news over the next three years. For context, Google committed $300M to news products and initiatives last March — with Newspack now being one of the beneficiaries. 💸

It's worth noting that Facebook and Google control the online ad market, and digital publishers have traditionally tried (but struggled) to make money from online ads. Regardless, money is money and the survival of local media is good news for all. 

In other news (how many news puns is too many?), we've been playing with some new writing tools: Write Together is a new spin on blogging and 200 Words a Day is a dead-simple tool that helps you write a little every single day.

On the surface, it seems like the ride-sharing market is oversaturated. 🚘

There's already category leaders Uber and Lyft, as well as countless others — Gett, Grab, Via, Didi, etc., etc. 

The problem: These ride-sharing companies have the potential to create a monopoly, and ultimate raise the price of how much it costs to get you from point A to point B. 🤔

Last week, a new app called SoMo launched to combat this — and ultimately give riders some freedom when it comes to getting around. 

How it works: SoMo is a “social transport” app that combines all modes of transport that are not a ride-hailing service. It allows people to create free rides (yes, free) through “social circles” around a specific destinations — from sporting events to concerts to the daily commute. It's kind of like Uber meets Google Maps meets your neighborhood carpool. 

Some responses from the community: 

“I love the idea of sharing rides with a network that I know” - Tal 

“One of those things where you say 'why didn’t anyone think of this sooner?' Great App, great concept and a great solution. I’m hooked.” - Gabby 

“My 12-year-old was SUPER excited about this app. And going to tell her friends about it. Which means that me and other moms are going to use it a lot.” - Inna 

SoMo will be available in 15 cities to start, including London, Athens, Barcelona, Amsterdam, Brussels, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Nice, Los Angeles, Helsinki, Piraeus, Thessaloniki, Almere Stad, Haarlem, and the Hague. If you don't live in one of those places, don't worry. The app's makers (Here Technologies) plan to launch in 10 new cities every month. 

We'll be watching where this goes — but you have to try it out for yourself.

We recently asked the Twitter-verse what their favorite productivity hacks are and got some....creative responses:

“Leave the charger at home” - Adrian

“Sleep after lunchtime for 30 mins” - Sasha

“Mushrooms” - Alex

Many of us spend a lot of time trying to hack, well, time. So might as well be unconventional.

We went down the Product Hunt rabbit hole and rounded up 10 of our favorite products to hack productivity:

Progress Bar OSX shows you the exact percentage of how much the day, month, year and your life has progressed in your OSX menu bar ⏳

“All technology is a time machine. Get your life back by treating it so.” - Chris

Taskr is a dead-simple task manager app that's perfect for small lists (and it's free) 📝

“I really love this app for planning all my work related tasks. It makes my daily planning in the morning so easy, since I can just grab my tasks from the backlog and start working. I think it sliced the time for the daily planning at least by 50%.” - Marius

Focuster ditches the to-list model and schedules your top priorities in your calendar 📆

“Focuster connects to your Google Calendar and helps you easily visualize how much free time you have and make the most of it. It flows around your existing events and is always updating so your most important work always stays top of mind.” - Jordan

Rooster is a Chrome extension that gives you insights on your browsing habits via push-notification when you lose focus 🙇‍

“Great app if you want to introspect your time and become more productive” - Kushagra

Social Pomodoro pairs you with an accountability buddy to keep you working for 25 minutes at a time 👫

“I had no idea having an accountability buddy in a pomodoro timer could be so amazing! I got done with tasks that usually talk me 2 hours withing 2 sessions- ie, 50 minutes” - Ayushi

7 Minute Workout is a scientific workout app from The New York Times that helps you get a realllly fast workout in 💪

“I love this workout. It's a great way to squeeze in exercise even on those busy days.” - Robleh

Thought Train is a menu bar app that keeps a list of your thoughts and tasks 🧠

“If anyone is like me and has a lot of balls flying in the air most days, it's super useful to when the 'wait, what was I working on again' thought pops up in my brain (like all the time) to do a quick glance at the top menu bar and go 'ah, there it was'” - Hrefna

The Most Dangerous Writing App loses your writing if you stop typing 😳

“Pretty good way to start your day. This is good for 'morning pages', without the pressure of writing something that can be 'saved for later'. “ - Sagar

Gone is like the Snapchat of to-do lists: all tasks will disappear 24 hours after adding them ⏰

“One big problem with to-do list apps is that to-dos tend to pile up. I specifically wanted something ephemeral - just for the day. This solves it perfectly.” - Dominic

Play (for Medium) lets you listen to Medium articles as podcasts to save time on reading articles 🎧

“If you write on Medium ... this should interest you.” - Arnie

What would you add to this list? Share it with us on Twitter and we'll RT the most useful, creative, or ridiculous recommendations. 😉