00:36:03 · Molly O'Shea, Dylan Field
[00:36:03] S0: Yeah. [00:36:03] S1: And just, you know, my friends hadn't graduated yet. I grew up in the Bay Area, but my friends in the North Bay, they were doing their own thing and it kind of was further to go. The chance to just be with this group of people and socialize with them, like, for me, was very important. Some people probably don't need that, but I don't know, like, once a week seeing a human. And other than my cofounder, you know, who I loved dearly, but, you know, his preference in the weekend was to write work on his compiler project. That's how he unwound. You know, he was special special brain, total genius. But, yeah, for me, that was, like, the biggest value that I did not even expect from that program. A 100 ks over two years, amazing. But the community was just even more special. [00:36:54] S0: We're gonna go for a curve ball right now. [00:36:57] S1: Okay. [00:36:57] S0: I know all of that is super fun, but we have this urgent question from Elad Gil. [00:37:03] S1: Yeah. [00:37:03] S0: Or Elad. I don't know how you like to pronounce it. [00:37:07] S1: It's a great controversy itself. [00:37:09] S0: It really is. I started my interview with it, I'm pretty sure I mispronounced it both times. Like, there I guess there's, like, more ways to He's [00:37:16] S1: very accepting is the good news. [00:37:19] S0: So are you ready for this? [00:37:21] S1: I don't know. [00:37:23] S0: I'm like laughing and I haven't even said it yet. Okay. Composure. Dylan, how can a man who is so skinny live a life so fat? P h a t. Fat.
00:37:23 · Molly O'Shea, Dylan Field
[00:37:23] S0: I'm like laughing and I haven't even said it yet. Okay. Composure. Dylan, how can a man who is so skinny live a life so fat? P h a t. Fat. [00:37:46] S1: With great mentorship from the Lod Gil. [00:37:50] S0: I I don't know. What sparked that question? [00:37:52] S1: Where is the question? I don't know what that means. [00:37:54] S0: I I genuinely don't know, but he sent it, so I asked it. [00:37:57] S1: I I think it's a compliment. I'm gonna take it as a compliment. [00:38:01] S0: I think you're living well. I think that's what he means. I love that. Okay. And then we have some from Christian Garrett too. [00:38:09] S1: Okay. [00:38:11] S0: Well, these aren't as no offense, Christian. These aren't as fun as So that Figma is on its air. Last earnings really proved it. We talked about this with Mark Pincus too. What are people missing about AI and enterprise software? [00:38:29] S1: I think that, first of all, markets snap to narratives. Right now, the narrative seems to be like software is kaput. [00:38:41] S0: Good time to buy, not investment advice.
00:38:41 · Molly O'Shea, Dylan Field
[00:38:41] S0: Good time to buy, not investment advice. [00:38:43] S1: But I think that a lot of software will do just fine or actually even amazing. And so then it's like, what are the properties of that software? Well, I think that network effects matter. I think network effects can show up not just in social and human situations, in collaboration or social networks, but also in marketplace liquidity. That is its own network effect. I think the sort of distribution of customer base matters. And I would say that boring software is not to be undercounted or things that people would call boring. Wouldn't But call it probably there are just so many things that you can find where the folks who are living the problem every day don't have that default impulse to go build software for it. And yet it's a huge problem. And finally, would say that the data liquidity that you can establish and how that can create context, how that context can create capability in a system, that is its own flywheel. And if you get that flywheel right, I think it's very value accruing to the customer in a way that can be extremely useful. So that's a lot of the stuff that I'm thinking about. [00:40:08] S0: And everyone is your customer. That's what I've [00:40:11] S1: I'm not sure [00:40:12] S0: if [00:40:13] S1: everyone, but we're lucky to have a lot of great software companies and companies around the world using Figma.
00:40:13 · Dylan Field, Molly O'Shea
[00:40:13] S1: everyone, but we're lucky to have a lot of great software companies and companies around the world using Figma. [00:40:19] S0: So let's talk about the evolution a little bit. This is another one of Christian's questions, but Figma evolved to platform from design to code to development and now multi product expansion. So where's the platform going next? [00:40:34] S1: I think both there's the impulse and the, like, quest of how do you take these surfaces and bring them more together. When you are leaning more into AI and generation, there's a huge opportunity in doing that in one place and not having to think about where do I start. And so that's something that I've always wanted to accomplish with Figma. It's extremely hard. And then there's also the question of like how broad can you go in terms of serving all the needs of a designer, which are growing and vast. I mean, designers are giving us the feedback that we used get from developers now. And so I think that if we could kind of do both of those and find ways to help people create their own tools on the platform, share them with their team, and get value out of that, that'll be really awesome. [00:41:23] S0: Lastly. [00:41:24] S1: Yeah. [00:41:25] S0: Well, not really lastly, but from Christian, why are you so bullish on SpaceX? [00:41:32] S1: Let's talk about SpaceX in the Pantone Lounge. [00:41:34] S0: Is SpaceX in the room with us right now? How are they?
00:41:34 · Molly O'Shea, Dylan Field
[00:41:34] S0: Is SpaceX in the room with us right now? How are they? [00:41:39] S1: First of all, I I think there's tons to be seen on, you know, AI and their cloud business, I guess. I really don't know how to read that. So let me just, like, remove all that for a moment [00:41:50] S0: Mhmm. [00:41:50] S1: The x AI part of it, and instead just talk about the non x AI part of it. I I mean, SpaceX is a great example of a company where you've got, amazing talent who are, I think, really missionary, and that talent, you know, goes and quests and conquers after challenge after challenge after challenge. And, I think that people lack imagination when it comes to what they can do on Earth and also what they can do in the stars and how important space can be in the long term. And I think that there's many categories that folks don't think of them going into, which they will go into probably. And I believe it could be a very, very important company for the century or the next. So I hope Figma can follow too. [00:42:46] S0: Elon Musk once said, if a product is special enough, it needs no logo. What do you think about that?
00:42:46 · Molly O'Shea, Dylan Field
[00:42:46] S0: Elon Musk once said, if a product is special enough, it needs no logo. What do you think about that? [00:42:53] S1: I actually think that that's right, but also if the product is that special, then I think it's probably got enough brand characteristics that it kind of functions as a logo. And so for example, a Tesla car. Can you take the Tesla logo off of a Tesla car? Sure. But you probably still know it's a Tesla. And if you don't, that's a problem for Tesla. And also, they have a logo. But I yeah. I think that overall, brand systems, you can do a lot with them, and there are many ways that, brands can show up to people. Logo is just a part of it. [00:43:29] S0: As we close out, Sorcery is proud to be sponsored by Brex, and they're all about performance and spending smarter moving faster as a startup or a large enterprise. I think performance really comes down to who you surround yourself with and, like, who you got inspired by, maybe who's mentored you along the way. Are there anybody in your circle or, like, on your career path of building out Figma that's really inspired you?