Agentic Tools, Figma, Airbnb, HBO, Roman Concrete and Happy Meals
Weekly Review of News in Technology, UX and AI
Here’s the latest news, resources, and use cases from the world of product, UX, AI and technology. Let’s go:
📊 Unstructured Data
🕵️ Agentic Tools
✍️ Figma
🏘️ Airbnb
📺 HBO Max
🏛️ Roman Concrete
🍔 Happy Meals
Podcast
Structured Thinking for Unstructured Data: A Conversation with Founder Kirk Marple
In this episode of Product by Design, Kyle is joined by Kirk Marple, founder and CEO of Graphlit, to explore the world of unstructured data and how it’s transforming with the rise of LLMs and AI-native tools. Kirk shares his journey from working at Microsoft and General Motors to building Graflit—a platform designed to make unstructured data as usable as structured data.
News and Useful Reads
OpenAI Launches an Agentic, Web-Based Coding Tool
Increasing people’s productivity by helping them automate their work so they can do more, and do it better, is certainly the optimistic perspective for AI. Hopefully, we’ll see more of this.
OpenAI’s Codex is available through the web for ChatGPT Pro users from today. It can generate lines of code but also move through directories and run commands inside a virtual computer, automating more of the work that developers go through when writing code.
‘From idea to product’: How Figma is redesigning workflows with its new line-up
I’m excited to try out some of the new tools from Figma. Anything that makes it easier to design and create products is good with me.
Figma Make, Figma Sites, Figma Draw, and Figma Buzz offers teams the ability to ideate and create everything from vector images to full-blown websites. And, as you’d expect, it’s all AI-powered for faster iteration.
Airbnb launches new services ahead of summer travel season
Airbnb is going beyond vacation rentals. It announced this week it will be adding services and experiences to the booking app, presumably in an attempt to become an everything app.
The vacation rental platform is redesigning its app and expanding its offerings with the launch of Airbnb Services and Airbnb Experiences, letting users go beyond booking a room or home stay and choose from a variety of amenities, similar to what hotel chains and cruises offer to guests.
Max was an all-time bad rebrand
It’s hard to imagine making a bigger mess of a rebrand than HBO did. But they’ve finally walked back part of it this week.
Max, formerly HBO Max, is now HBO Max again. Warner Bros. Discovery announced the change today, rolling back one of the clumsiest rebrands in history from a streaming service that’s had more than its share of clumsy ideas.
Other Interesting Finds
We Finally Know Why Ancient Roman Concrete Lasts Thousands of Years
I find the story of concrete fascinating. How it was used for so long, perfected by the Romans, then basically lost until very recently. The secret to Roman concrete wasn’t just the ingredients, but how they made it.
In 2023, an international team of researchers led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found that not only are the materials slightly different from what we may have thought, but the techniques used to mix them were also different.
Happy meals: is eating together the secret to happiness?
Apparently, it’s still good advice to not eat alone.
Sharing meals is the one of the best things we can do for our wellbeing, according to a report released last month. The World Happiness report 2025, based on a Gallup poll of more than 150,000 people from 142 countries and territories, found that people who dine alone have the lowest life evaluation rating globally compared with those who regularly share a meal, who are happier.