Matt McDonagh

Matt McDonagh

Data engineer & tech investor
46 points
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Nika

9mo ago

ChatGPT is becoming "a shopping AI agent". What is the future of Google, then?

Yesterday, I came across an article on TechCrunch that OpenAI is upgrading ChatGPT search with shopping features.

Slowly but surely, ChatGPT is taking over Google's role and doing it well. I ve noticed it myself, especially how it s replaced much of my browsing.

Parth Ahir

9mo ago

Will creativity lose its meaning in the age of AI?

Lately, I ve been reflecting on the quiet fear that, as AI tools become better at creating art, writing, and design, creativity itself might lose its meaning.

It feels like a valid concern because:

  • AI can produce beautiful art and music faster than a human ever could,

  • Many creative fields are shifting from original creation to "curating" or "editing" AI outputs,

  • Instant generation often replaces slow, imperfect human exploration,

  • Younger generations are growing up with AI co-creation as the norm, not the exception.

I wonder:
Will true creativity still matter when "good enough" is instantly available?

Nika

9mo ago

What strategies do you usually use for growing your social media and newsletter when you stagnate?

A few weeks ago, I started to feel like I had hit a plateau on social media, especially with my Substack newsletter. I couldn t seem to get past a certain number of subscribers (stagnation).

In similar situations, I ve noticed that people often either:
run a giveaway
pay for ads

Matt McDonagh

9mo ago

Top 3 Vibe Coding Tricks

What are your top tricks or techniques when building apps and other digital experiences with AI?

The foundation of any successful collaboration, whether human or digital, is mutual understanding and shared context. When onboarding a new developer, you provide essential information about the project's architecture, technology stack, coding conventions, and goals... we can call it "vibe coding" all we want, but to be effective we need more than just vibes.

Sean McCarney

9mo ago

Notes from a failed Product Hunt launch

After hours of reading best practices, crafting the perfect assets and assembling what felt like a bulletproof plan, we were ready to launch on Product Hunt. We worked so hard and genuinely believed we d wake up to thousands of sign ups and the Product of the Day badge.

The reality was very different. We saw a tiny boost in sign ups, got stuck at around 200 upvotes, and to top it off, finished below a food blender.

Nika

9mo ago

Longevity tools, the potential of this business model and which ones to use?

Since I've been watching Bryan Johnson's experiments on his body, I've also become interested in tools that help to improve life. (Mainly hardware, but also software.)

In my opinion, more and more people from more developed countries want to improve the quality of their lives, and therefore they are willing to invest quite a lot in these things.

I can see it predominantly in the US market, UK, Canada, Germany, France, and possibly Sweden.

Gabe Perez

9mo ago

Vibe coding process - do we jump in or plan it out?

I'm super curious how everyone starts to vibe code? In the beginning I would simply jump into @bolt.new or @Cursor and just do a prompt and continue refining with the AI. I quickly realized this created a lot of issues as I didn't think about the structure, tech stack, and how I wanted the features to interact with each other and how the way I was building things would impact the user experience. I now do the following:

  • Write down a simple problem statement: "what am I trying to solve?"

  • Write down a simple solution statement: "what does the thing I'm building do (to solve the problem)"

  • Share the above with @ChatGPT by OpenAI and word vomit my thoughts, ideas, how I want the user to interact with my app, etc and ASK ChatGPT to turn everything I said and want into an easy to understand directive and instructions for an Engineer.

  • I then take the Engineer instructions and give it to a new chat in ChatGPT and ask it to turn those instructions into a prompt for an AI engineer and to break up the project into sections so that each time we focus on a section the app is shippable and keeps things easy to work on.

  • I take the output and paste it into my notes. I then give it to Cursor.

  • Once in Cursor, I create a new project folder and got at it!

Curious what everyone else does and if you've experience any things to avoid or must do

Gabe Perez

9mo ago

Vibe coding process - do we jump in or plan it out?

I'm super curious how everyone starts to vibe code? In the beginning I would simply jump into @bolt.new or @Cursor and just do a prompt and continue refining with the AI. I quickly realized this created a lot of issues as I didn't think about the structure, tech stack, and how I wanted the features to interact with each other and how the way I was building things would impact the user experience. I now do the following:

  • Write down a simple problem statement: "what am I trying to solve?"

  • Write down a simple solution statement: "what does the thing I'm building do (to solve the problem)"

  • Share the above with @ChatGPT by OpenAI and word vomit my thoughts, ideas, how I want the user to interact with my app, etc and ASK ChatGPT to turn everything I said and want into an easy to understand directive and instructions for an Engineer.

  • I then take the Engineer instructions and give it to a new chat in ChatGPT and ask it to turn those instructions into a prompt for an AI engineer and to break up the project into sections so that each time we focus on a section the app is shippable and keeps things easy to work on.

  • I take the output and paste it into my notes. I then give it to Cursor.

  • Once in Cursor, I create a new project folder and got at it!

Curious what everyone else does and if you've experience any things to avoid or must do

steve beyatte

9mo ago

Is bootstrapping a superpower or a slow death in the AI era?

AI has made it easier than ever to build and ship with a small team and no funding- but is that a better playbook than raising VC?

I see it from both sides:

  • Getting to production, ramen profitability, etc. seems easier than ever. Yay bootstrapping.

  • Because it's so easy, getting blown out of the water by a VC-funded competitor also seems easier than ever.

Pilotp/pilotWaseem Daher

9mo ago

Founder Salary Confessions: How Much Should You Pay Yourself? AMA with 3x Founder Waseem Daher

Hey Product Hunt! I'm Waseem Daher, co-founder of Pilot, the largest startup-focused accounting company in the US. I'm a 3x founder (my previous ventures were acquired by Oracle and Dropbox) who's raised over $120M from Sequoia, Stripe, Jeff Bezos, and more.

Today we're releasing our 2025 Founder Salary Report with data from 1,800+ founders, and the findings might surprise you:

  • Founder salaries dropped 43% in the past year

  • AI founders are bucking the trend (paying themselves more)

  • Bootstrapped companies jumped 57%

  • Only 5.4% of founders pay themselves nothing (down from 9% last year)

We founders talk endlessly about burn rates, runway, and valuations but no one talks about what they pay themselves. It's time to change that.

🚀 Launching on Product Hunt Soon? Drop Your Preview for Feedback!

Got a launch coming up? Don t go in blind share your upcoming Product Hunt launch here and get early feedback from fellow makers.

Whether you want thoughts on your:

  • Tagline or messaging

  • Screenshots or video

  • First comment

  • Timing or strategy

Pilotp/pilotWaseem Daher

9mo ago

Founder Salary Confessions: How Much Should You Pay Yourself? AMA with 3x Founder Waseem Daher

Hey Product Hunt! I'm Waseem Daher, co-founder of Pilot, the largest startup-focused accounting company in the US. I'm a 3x founder (my previous ventures were acquired by Oracle and Dropbox) who's raised over $120M from Sequoia, Stripe, Jeff Bezos, and more.

Today we're releasing our 2025 Founder Salary Report with data from 1,800+ founders, and the findings might surprise you:

  • Founder salaries dropped 43% in the past year

  • AI founders are bucking the trend (paying themselves more)

  • Bootstrapped companies jumped 57%

  • Only 5.4% of founders pay themselves nothing (down from 9% last year)

We founders talk endlessly about burn rates, runway, and valuations but no one talks about what they pay themselves. It's time to change that.

Pilotp/pilotWaseem Daher

9mo ago

Founder Salary Confessions: How Much Should You Pay Yourself? AMA with 3x Founder Waseem Daher

Hey Product Hunt! I'm Waseem Daher, co-founder of Pilot, the largest startup-focused accounting company in the US. I'm a 3x founder (my previous ventures were acquired by Oracle and Dropbox) who's raised over $120M from Sequoia, Stripe, Jeff Bezos, and more.

Today we're releasing our 2025 Founder Salary Report with data from 1,800+ founders, and the findings might surprise you:

  • Founder salaries dropped 43% in the past year

  • AI founders are bucking the trend (paying themselves more)

  • Bootstrapped companies jumped 57%

  • Only 5.4% of founders pay themselves nothing (down from 9% last year)

We founders talk endlessly about burn rates, runway, and valuations but no one talks about what they pay themselves. It's time to change that.

Nika

9mo ago

Do you trust any particular LLM model? (Your preferences over other AI solutions)

Yesterday, Meta announced that they have released a new collection of AI models, Llama 4, in its Llama family.

(It consists of Llama 4 Scout, Llama 4 Maverick, and Llama 4 Behemoth.)

Historically, Open AI with its ChatGPT has been on the market for the longest period.

Matt McDonagh

9mo ago

Orion AI Life Copilot - From Goal Setting to Goal Getting. Powered by AI.

The World's First AI Life Copilot. Stop letting great goals fade. Use AI to break down your biggest ambitions into clear, manageable habits and tasks. Stay motivated and crush your targets with fun, gamified features that reward progress. It's time to achieve.
imbud

9mo ago

Which is more important: making a great product or doing effective marketing?

Hello, Product Hunt!
I vote for "marketing is more important!"
Recently, building has become really easy with the help of AI agents and tools like Cursor(thx Ai). I think the time and money needed to create a good product have significantly decreased thanks to various SaaS programs.
However, I still don t have any references to introduce to you ( ). I feel like I ve neglected marketing, which is more important than making the product. (Please tell me this is the real reason...) Especially for indie makers like me, marketing is the hardest part (I wish someone could do it for me! ).
Making a good product and promoting it are both important, and it s a pointless debate.
Still, making vs. marketing? What do you all think?
And if there are any cost-free ways for indie marketers or beginner marketers to try out, could you let me know?

What were the things that Cursor couldn't "fix" for you?

Hello PH!

I'm Hyuntak form South Korea, quite new to this community, first time posting.

I'm a med student and solo developer.

Nika

10mo ago

How did you handle a crisis situation that could have destroyed your company's reputation?

This week I came across a picture on Twitter of a well-known startup that was leaking its database credentials.

Someone pointed it out under a post and the company suddenly deleted the post.

Raycastp/raycastfmerian

10mo ago

New in Raycast - AI Extensions Beta

Raycast recently released AI Extensions in Beta Start typing `@` to use your extensions with AI. The demo is mind-blowing.

Have you experimented with this new feature yet? Any good examples?

Aaron O'Leary

10mo ago

What's one pain point you have as a founder right now? Let's collab on solutions

Nobody said running a startup was easy but some issues whether it's increasing DAU, perfecting ad copy, increasing MRR, hiring, or whatever can be pull your hair out levels of frustration.

What's one pain point you are struggling with at the moment? Drop it in the replies and then help someone else based on your experience!