The great Evernote reboot | The Vergecast
16 Sep 2024 (4 days ago)
Evernote's Acquisition and Future Plans
- Bending Spoons, a tech incubator and private equity company, acquired Evernote in late 2022.
- Bending Spoons laid off most of Evernote's staff and moved operations to Europe.
Evernote's Focus on Note-Taking
- Evernote is viewed as a tool for individual note taking, helping users organize their systems.
- Evernote is prioritizing individual note-taking features based on user feedback.
- Evernote is focused on note taking and improving the core note taking experience.
- Evernote's primary focus is to improve the quality of life and synchronization for note taking.
- Evernote users employ diverse note-taking methods, with no two users following the exact same system.
- Evernote aims to cater to a wide range of user preferences, including those who prefer AI-driven organization and those who desire a customizable, user-directed approach.
Evernote's Features and Development
- After focusing on understanding and rewriting critical parts of Evernote's codebase, Bending Spoons prioritized real-time editing, enabling instantaneous note synchronization across devices.
- Rent, a project to synchronize metadata in Evernote, was launched after the release of RT, which synchronizes note content.
- Evernote is developing AI-powered search functionality that will allow users to search for specific information within their notes without needing to know the exact location of the information.
- Evernote's AI search functionality will allow users to search for information such as their Delta frequent flyer number and have it returned to them directly.
- Evernote has an end-to-end encryption feature.
- Evernote launched a new synchronization engine called "rent".
- Evernote redesigned their mobile homepage because the old one was slow.
- There are tradeoffs between adding new features to Evernote and maintaining support for older operating systems.
- Evernote's web clipper remains superior to competitors, even after many years.
- Evernote is focusing on "quality of life" improvements, addressing long-standing user requests like collapsible sections, rather than solely focusing on metrics-driven product development.
- Evernote users have expressed a desire for improved note and notebook sharing capabilities.
- Evernote users requested the ability to make inline comments within notes, similar to the slash command feature in Slack.
- Users also expressed a desire for better image alignment options within Evernote, including the ability to center and right-align images.
- Evernote users requested improved task management features, likely because basic task features already existed but were underdeveloped.
- Evernote will not be focusing on developing a calendar client.
- Evernote finds inspiration from non-note-taking software, such as Slack's comment UX and quick switcher functionality (CMD+K), which Evernote has implemented as CMD+J.
- The development team went through numerous iterations to refine the navigation and homepage, ultimately adding customization settings to allow users to personalize their experience.
- Future development priorities for Evernote include perfecting core features like note-taking and exploring the potential of collaboration and AI, while ensuring a smooth and intuitive user experience to attract new users.
Evernote's Approach to Collaboration
- While note sharing and real-time collaboration are desired features, Evernote is not focused on collaborative project management.
Evernote's Business Strategy
- Evernote’s price increases were necessary to ensure the product’s sustainability and future development.
- Despite some negative feedback, Evernote’s retention rate is currently at an all-time high.
- Evernote's recent price increase is intended to last for years, with adjustments made only when necessary, such as for inflation.
- Evernote sees itself as distinct from competitors, focusing on customer needs rather than imitating other products.
- Evernote is aiming for a balance between simple defaults and powerful customization options to cater to both casual and power users.
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