Framework
Multiplayer software: turn single-player tools into shared ones
Shaan lays out his 'multiplayer software' framework: Figma made Photoshop collaborative, Google Docs made Word multiplayer, Front made the inbox multiplayer. He scans his desktop for single-player apps and asks which could be made shared, landing on the browser as the biggest untapped one.
“So I just look at on my computer screen, I go look at the, the, the kind of the desktop apps, all the apps I have, and I just think, which ones of these are single player today that could be multiplayer? And the biggest one is, uh, the browser. So Chrome, right, or Safari or whatever you use. So today your browser is a completely single player experience.”
Steal thisList every single-player desktop app you use and pick the one where real-time collaboration would create the most value, then build the multiplayer version.
Framework
Make single-player tools collaborative to mint multi-billion-dollar companies
Shaan's repeatable pattern: take a staple tool used solo and build the team/collaborative version. Photoshop to Figma, Word to Google Docs, email to Front. Cracking the collaborative use case of a single-player staple is a recipe for multi-billion-dollar companies, and he'd fund someone doing it for the browser.
“anytime you take a staple tool that's today used only single player, and if you actually crack the collaborative use case, it's a recipe for multi-billion dollar companies. It just keeps happening. So if I found that around the browser, I'd be excited about it.”
Steal thisFind a widely-used single-player tool and build its real-time collaborative, multiplayer version.
Framework
Single-player to multiplayer: the collaboration wedge
Shaan's idea-generation framework: take any work tool that's still solo and make it collaborative, the way Google Docs did to Word, Airtable to Excel, and Figma to Photoshop. Find what's still single-player and make it multiplayer.
“So the question is what's left? What is something that today we all still do solo, you know, single player and we should be doing it multiplayer. And so I don't know what's left, like design has been done, docs has been done, Excel has been done, but there might be something still in the sort of workflow or workspace. And maybe it's by vertical, maybe like consulting companies use this one thing a lot or defense contractors use this one thing, but like everything that's a solo player thing will be multiplayer.”
Steal thisFind a work tool that's still single-player and build the collaborative, browser-based multiplayer version.