What Jason Fried Learned from 26 Years of Building Great Products

37signals makes tens of millions in profit every year but ⁠Jason Fried⁠ isn’t all that interested in running a business. Instead, he cares most about making great products—like ⁠Basecamp⁠, ⁠HEY⁠, and ⁠Ruby on Rails⁠—products that are centered around a single, coherent idea. These products are complete wholes, where each piece matters—like a Frank Lloyd Wright house or a vintage car. But how do you create products like that? In this conversation, we talk to Jason about what two decades of building 37signals has been like—and how to build products that have soul. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: ⁠https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt⁠. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: - Subscribe to Every: ⁠https://every.to/subscribe⁠ - Follow him on X: ⁠https://twitter.com/danshipper⁠ Listen to Working Smarter wherever you get your podcasts, or visit ⁠workingsmarter.ai⁠. Timestamps: 00:00:00 - Start 00:00:32 - Introduction 00:02:06 - What architecture, watches, and cars teach us about software 00:10:54 - How Jason thinks AI plays into product-building 00:20:58 - How developers at 37signals use AI 00:25:47 - Jason’s biggest realization after 26 years of running 37signals 00:29:58 - Where Jason thinks luck shaped his career 00:32:41 - What Jason would do if he were graduated into the AI boom 00:37:22 - Dan asks for advice on running a non-traditional company like Every 00:46:39 - Why staying true to yourself is the only way to build something lasting 00:49:38 - Wholeness as the north star for building products—and companies Links to resources mentioned in the episode: - Jason Fried: ⁠Jason Fried (@jasonfried)⁠, ⁠Jason Fried⁠ - More about 37Signals: ⁠37signals⁠ - The book about architecture by Christopher Alexander: [⁠ The Timeless Way of Building ⁠](https://www.amazon.com/Timeless-Way-Building-Christopher-Alexander/dp/[redacted phone])