9 ms·

Notion is not an example of delightful software and it is very much one of the most reproducible apps ever. I don't know how they managed to make it fashionable

Notion is not an example of delightful software and it is very much one of the most reproducible apps ever. I don't know how they managed to make it fashionable amongst startups, but it's certainly not because it's an innovative product.

huslage 2y ago
Y Combinator. They gave it away to all of them. This is how you become popular with startups.
- slowtrek 2y ago
  That's really gross. I guess then everyone thinks they need to use it because all these startups use it, but it's really just a simple notepad app with many alternatives.
  - virgil_disgr4ce 2y ago
    I have no interest in defending Notion or anything but... have you actually used it? It's not even close to a "simple notepad app." I mean, that's what it started off as, and you can use it that way, but "simple notepad app" is ludicrously wrong.
    - pimeys 2y ago
      Yep. And I've hated every second when I needed to write something with it. The editor of Notion is horrible, compared to Zed, Vim, Emacs et.al. The markdown import has been broken for years, and it is not easy to export your writeups for storage outside Notion I'm really happy I got our company out from using Notion. We just do markdown in Linear, which you can copy and paste from an editor easily.
  - TheRealPomax 2y ago
    No, they use it because it was cheap and useful, and switching tools to something newer that's actually better has to not just be better, it has to be so much better as to justify the time and costs required to port a bulky knowledge base from one platform to another. It's really just standard "voluntary lock-in": any knowledge system you decide to use locks you into that knowledge system simply because you're going to be generating tons of content in it, which may at some point need to be migrated, and the longer you use it the more of a hassle that'll be. And if it feels a bit gross (it's not, really, it's just what happens when someone has a good sales pitch) they're not holding your content hostage like some other platforms *cough*zendesk*cough*.
  - mulmen 2y ago
    Isn’t this exactly why accelerators like Y Combinator exist? To provide all the necessary things that aren’t your startup?
staplers 2y ago
it is very much one of the most reproducible apps ever Would love to move to an alternative that also works in the browser, got any suggestions? I haven't found one that does what Notion does. I genuinely want to get off their AI training grounds but cannot. Your comment reeks of condescension because you are not the target user.
- slowtrek 2y ago
  Shared Google Docs.
  - no_wizard 2y ago
    Google Docs isn’t near the same as Notion. Not even close. Notion treats information as a repository and keeps things indexed, searchable, and has some ways to automatically sort things, has ability to seamlessly create different types of documents and weave them together and so much more that Docs lack. Docs doesn’t even have native markdown support last I checked
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - spondylosaurus 2y ago
      You can use Markdown in Google Docs, but it automatically gets converted to rich text. (When you copy/paste rich text out of Google Docs, there's also a "Copy as Markdown" option, but it'll default to a particular Markdown syntax that may not be the one you refer.)
      - no_wizard 2y ago
        Even conceding markdown support it still lacks the organization and document flexibility of notion
- StrauXX 2y ago
  We are currently moving to the Odoo knowledge application. It's very similar to notion but much less sluggish.
virdev 2y ago
I also have to disagree here. What Notion has built is amazing. When leadership tells us our job is to replace Microsoft Office. I say it's not This is Libre Office's job. While I truly admire this community’s work. If I ever get anywhere close to their level I’ll consider myself lucky. They do important work and I hope they continue for may years . I’m not trying to replace Microsoft Office because work has changed. As it came online, it became collaborative. What’s replacing Microsoft isn’t perfectly similar alternatives to text editing, spreadsheets and slides which are tools that were made for formatting more than content editing. These were meant to be printed to be shared. What’s actually replacing Microsoft Office are tools like Notion. Nowadays content is created in real time with 4, 6 or more pair of hands typing at the same time. ⌨ The way we actually replace Microsoft Office is by building products that follow the change in usage like Notion has been doing. That’s what we need to do as an opensource community. Adopting Notion won't do in times like we're living as states (hell, all of us!) we need strategic digital autonomy. The product of our collaborative work is knowledge, we can't have it siphoned because it's sitting on an American server. Notion has been leading the content over form revolution for a while now. But revolutions are our thing right ? We like to start them, but it's way more fun when they spread to the whole continent Want to join us or support us with a little GitHub https://github.com/suitenumerique/docs https://github.com/suitenumerique/docs
- palata 2y ago
  Notion is some kind of Kanban board, isn't it? I think the point of the parent is that such boards were not invented by Notion, and writing a webapp that essentially allows you to move post-its between columns is not exactly innovative. Which is fine, if it works. We don't always need innovation (actually most of the time we don't). Notion just seems to be super popular for just being a webapp of post-its.
  - fmbb 2y ago
    Notion is a wiki. It’s like Confluence but good. Maybe they have tickets and boards as well? Even better!
  - setopt 2y ago
kellpossible2 2y ago
please name some open source (or lower priced) alternatives that support: comments on documents, database functionality to a similar level, publishing websites, scripting for properties. I'm very curious!
- somat 2y ago
  The unix operating environment. I was going to say git, but really you need the whole environment.
  - bigiain 2y ago
    Heh. I remember back in the comp.lang.perl.misc days, where newbies would show up and ask "What's the best IDE for Perl development" and all the longtime greybeards would reply "Unix".
paulgb 2y ago
When it came out, block-based editing and always-on wysiwig were novel, and Notion was definitely more delightful than the existing “internal wiki” software category (Confluence etc.)
slevis 2y ago
Several companies have tried to "reproduce" Notion and have failed. I don't like or use Notion but that is just extremely ignorant of the USP behind it. Dunning–Kruger much?
bayindirh 2y ago
Notion's data model is incredible, actually. You can embed almost anything into it, and make it work across your knowledge base. Databases work like spreadsheets, and you can embed pages inside them, too. In fact, every row is a potential page, if you want. While I prefer Obsidian for my technical (public and private) knowledge bases, life organization, and specific help pages I create for relatives live in Notion, and it works really well. Being able to script and formulate things allows great flexibility. What I'm not very comfortable yet is "ejecting" from Notion, since the data model is so convoluted, what they give you as a package is not very convenient, yet. Evernote had the best mechanism, giving you an XML file and an official XSLT to read/verify/transform what they give you. However, Evernote feels very underpowered when you start to use formulae and automation across your database.
- 1oooqooq 2y ago
  are you a notion employee? the data model is banal. just a tree with limited "type" strings for the special things. it's literally no different than any other file format. and they make it as difficult to export as all the other companies
  - bayindirh 2y ago
    > are you a notion employee? What I do is clearly written in my profile. Tangentially, do somebody has to be employee of $CORPORATION to like $CORPORATION.$PRODUCT? Banal is boring, boring is good. If they can do useful and novel things with banal and boring things (which they can from my experience), it's doubly good. They give a Markdown and CSV version of the stored data, which is not that bad, IMHO. Still doesn't beat Evernote on that regard, though. As with all tools, Horses for Courses, YMMV & moreover, Caveat Emptor.
    - 1oooqooq 2y ago
      so they store the data in a tree with special types for text or images... and output only a csv or markdown for you outside? honest question, how does this make the data model relevant? internally it's the same as Microsoft word even, and you can't benefit from it as it export without the structure.
berkes 2y ago
> very much one of the most reproducible apps ever. It isn't. The proof is simple: there aren't many reproductions that *tick all the boxes*. And no, "a directory of markdown files" isn't even close, it ticks two, maybe three of the dozens of boxes that notion ticks. Joplin (my daily driver) and obsidian (can't get to like it) are closer, but certainly not there - though these alternatives tick some boxes that notion doesn't tick. Edit: But most of all, what "boxes notion ticks" very much depends on your (teams) needs and usage. A feature you may deem unimportant or even an anti-feature may very well be what keeps a lot of people on notion because no alternative has it. The closest I have seen and used is appflowy. In some areas it ticks boxes that notion doesn't. But it's also "0.x" version software: self-admiddetly not 1.x stable software. And this has been in the makings since nov 2021, so over three years. Over three years of development to get to a point that it's on-par-ish with Notion. If it takes a team three years to reproduce "the most reproducible app", it's clear that this app isn't that reproducible at all. And that's just reproducing features (amongst witch UX and UI). Reproducible also includes familiarity: It's almost a no-brainer to get a team on notion and to have management pay a pro licence. It's much harder, to impossible, to do this with [insert any alternative].
- k__ 2y ago
  To me, Notion always felt like someone took the concept of a wiki and Jira-fied it. Crazy how such a simple tool can feel so slow and klunky :/
  - wvh 2y ago
    Funny how someone can invent a word such as Jirafied and most of us know exactly what that means.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- naravara 2y ago
  The other thing Notion has that’s tough to replicate is the network effects. Enough “influencer” type people use it that there’s a pretty rich universe of readymade and shareable templates and workflows available for other users. These can be replicated in similar applications, but that takes work. The fact that it got popular with productivity influencers seems pretty key to its initial and sustained popularity, even if it’s performance and the general clunkiness of its interface is frustrating.

huslage 2y ago

Y Combinator. They gave it away to all of them. This is how you become popular with startups.

slowtrek 2y ago
That's really gross. I guess then everyone thinks they need to use it because all these startups use it, but it's really just a simple notepad app with many alternatives.
- virgil_disgr4ce 2y ago
  I have no interest in defending Notion or anything but... have you actually used it? It's not even close to a "simple notepad app." I mean, that's what it started off as, and you can use it that way, but "simple notepad app" is ludicrously wrong.
  - pimeys 2y ago
    Yep. And I've hated every second when I needed to write something with it. The editor of Notion is horrible, compared to Zed, Vim, Emacs et.al. The markdown import has been broken for years, and it is not easy to export your writeups for storage outside Notion I'm really happy I got our company out from using Notion. We just do markdown in Linear, which you can copy and paste from an editor easily.
- TheRealPomax 2y ago
  No, they use it because it was cheap and useful, and switching tools to something newer that's actually better has to not just be better, it has to be so much better as to justify the time and costs required to port a bulky knowledge base from one platform to another. It's really just standard "voluntary lock-in": any knowledge system you decide to use locks you into that knowledge system simply because you're going to be generating tons of content in it, which may at some point need to be migrated, and the longer you use it the more of a hassle that'll be. And if it feels a bit gross (it's not, really, it's just what happens when someone has a good sales pitch) they're not holding your content hostage like some other platforms *cough*zendesk*cough*.
- mulmen 2y ago
  Isn’t this exactly why accelerators like Y Combinator exist? To provide all the necessary things that aren’t your startup?

staplers 2y ago

it is very much one of the most reproducible apps ever Would love to move to an alternative that also works in the browser, got any suggestions? I haven't found one that does what Notion does. I genuinely want to get off their AI training grounds but cannot. Your comment reeks of condescension because you are not the target user.

slowtrek 2y ago
Shared Google Docs.
- no_wizard 2y ago
  Google Docs isn’t near the same as Notion. Not even close. Notion treats information as a repository and keeps things indexed, searchable, and has some ways to automatically sort things, has ability to seamlessly create different types of documents and weave them together and so much more that Docs lack. Docs doesn’t even have native markdown support last I checked
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - spondylosaurus 2y ago
    You can use Markdown in Google Docs, but it automatically gets converted to rich text. (When you copy/paste rich text out of Google Docs, there's also a "Copy as Markdown" option, but it'll default to a particular Markdown syntax that may not be the one you refer.)
    - no_wizard 2y ago
      Even conceding markdown support it still lacks the organization and document flexibility of notion
StrauXX 2y ago
We are currently moving to the Odoo knowledge application. It's very similar to notion but much less sluggish.

virdev 2y ago

I also have to disagree here. What Notion has built is amazing. When leadership tells us our job is to replace Microsoft Office. I say it's not This is Libre Office's job. While I truly admire this community’s work. If I ever get anywhere close to their level I’ll consider myself lucky. They do important work and I hope they continue for may years . I’m not trying to replace Microsoft Office because work has changed. As it came online, it became collaborative. What’s replacing Microsoft isn’t perfectly similar alternatives to text editing, spreadsheets and slides which are tools that were made for formatting more than content editing. These were meant to be printed to be shared. What’s actually replacing Microsoft Office are tools like Notion. Nowadays content is created in real time with 4, 6 or more pair of hands typing at the same time. ⌨ The way we actually replace Microsoft Office is by building products that follow the change in usage like Notion has been doing. That’s what we need to do as an opensource community. Adopting Notion won't do in times like we're living as states (hell, all of us!) we need strategic digital autonomy. The product of our collaborative work is knowledge, we can't have it siphoned because it's sitting on an American server. Notion has been leading the content over form revolution for a while now. But revolutions are our thing right ? We like to start them, but it's way more fun when they spread to the whole continent Want to join us or support us with a little GitHub https://github.com/suitenumerique/docs https://github.com/suitenumerique/docs

palata 2y ago
Notion is some kind of Kanban board, isn't it? I think the point of the parent is that such boards were not invented by Notion, and writing a webapp that essentially allows you to move post-its between columns is not exactly innovative. Which is fine, if it works. We don't always need innovation (actually most of the time we don't). Notion just seems to be super popular for just being a webapp of post-its.
- fmbb 2y ago
  Notion is a wiki. It’s like Confluence but good. Maybe they have tickets and boards as well? Even better!
- setopt 2y ago

kellpossible2 2y ago

please name some open source (or lower priced) alternatives that support: comments on documents, database functionality to a similar level, publishing websites, scripting for properties. I'm very curious!

somat 2y ago
The unix operating environment. I was going to say git, but really you need the whole environment.
- bigiain 2y ago
  Heh. I remember back in the comp.lang.perl.misc days, where newbies would show up and ask "What's the best IDE for Perl development" and all the longtime greybeards would reply "Unix".

paulgb 2y ago

When it came out, block-based editing and always-on wysiwig were novel, and Notion was definitely more delightful than the existing “internal wiki” software category (Confluence etc.)

slevis 2y ago

Several companies have tried to "reproduce" Notion and have failed. I don't like or use Notion but that is just extremely ignorant of the USP behind it. Dunning–Kruger much?

bayindirh 2y ago

Notion's data model is incredible, actually. You can embed almost anything into it, and make it work across your knowledge base. Databases work like spreadsheets, and you can embed pages inside them, too. In fact, every row is a potential page, if you want. While I prefer Obsidian for my technical (public and private) knowledge bases, life organization, and specific help pages I create for relatives live in Notion, and it works really well. Being able to script and formulate things allows great flexibility. What I'm not very comfortable yet is "ejecting" from Notion, since the data model is so convoluted, what they give you as a package is not very convenient, yet. Evernote had the best mechanism, giving you an XML file and an official XSLT to read/verify/transform what they give you. However, Evernote feels very underpowered when you start to use formulae and automation across your database.

1oooqooq 2y ago
are you a notion employee? the data model is banal. just a tree with limited "type" strings for the special things. it's literally no different than any other file format. and they make it as difficult to export as all the other companies
- bayindirh 2y ago
  > are you a notion employee? What I do is clearly written in my profile. Tangentially, do somebody has to be employee of $CORPORATION to like $CORPORATION.$PRODUCT? Banal is boring, boring is good. If they can do useful and novel things with banal and boring things (which they can from my experience), it's doubly good. They give a Markdown and CSV version of the stored data, which is not that bad, IMHO. Still doesn't beat Evernote on that regard, though. As with all tools, Horses for Courses, YMMV & moreover, Caveat Emptor.
  - 1oooqooq 2y ago
    so they store the data in a tree with special types for text or images... and output only a csv or markdown for you outside? honest question, how does this make the data model relevant? internally it's the same as Microsoft word even, and you can't benefit from it as it export without the structure.

berkes 2y ago

> very much one of the most reproducible apps ever. It isn't. The proof is simple: there aren't many reproductions that *tick all the boxes*. And no, "a directory of markdown files" isn't even close, it ticks two, maybe three of the dozens of boxes that notion ticks. Joplin (my daily driver) and obsidian (can't get to like it) are closer, but certainly not there - though these alternatives tick some boxes that notion doesn't tick. Edit: But most of all, what "boxes notion ticks" very much depends on your (teams) needs and usage. A feature you may deem unimportant or even an anti-feature may very well be what keeps a lot of people on notion because no alternative has it. The closest I have seen and used is appflowy. In some areas it ticks boxes that notion doesn't. But it's also "0.x" version software: self-admiddetly not 1.x stable software. And this has been in the makings since nov 2021, so over three years. Over three years of development to get to a point that it's on-par-ish with Notion. If it takes a team three years to reproduce "the most reproducible app", it's clear that this app isn't that reproducible at all. And that's just reproducing features (amongst witch UX and UI). Reproducible also includes familiarity: It's almost a no-brainer to get a team on notion and to have management pay a pro licence. It's much harder, to impossible, to do this with [insert any alternative].

k__ 2y ago
To me, Notion always felt like someone took the concept of a wiki and Jira-fied it. Crazy how such a simple tool can feel so slow and klunky :/
- wvh 2y ago
  Funny how someone can invent a word such as Jirafied and most of us know exactly what that means.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
naravara 2y ago
The other thing Notion has that’s tough to replicate is the network effects. Enough “influencer” type people use it that there’s a pretty rich universe of readymade and shareable templates and workflows available for other users. These can be replicated in similar applications, but that takes work. The fact that it got popular with productivity influencers seems pretty key to its initial and sustained popularity, even if it’s performance and the general clunkiness of its interface is frustrating.