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My name is Philipp and you are reading Creativerly, the internet corner where I unpack my musings, curate and write about noteworthy apps and software, and explore the latest trends in design and tech.
Hey and welcome to Creativerly 306 👋It is time to wrap up the year, 2024 is coming to an end, and this is the last issue of Creativerly of the year. It was a packed year, and I deeply enjoyed writing and maintaining Creativerly for another 12 months. I published over 30 posts across the categories of Deep Dives, Notes, and News. I explored apps like Flyleaf, Webstudio, Elicit, and Horse Browser, wrote about how I am generating ideas to write about, why we should embrace information overload with personal curation, the half-life of productivity software, what matters most when choosing a note-taking app, and the underwhelming truth of personal knowledge management. Besides that, my new content series Tiny macOS utility apps I love and post like There is still the need for a better Goodreads alternative or The Web of choices became some of the most popular and most-read posts on Creativerly. I am thankful for all the ongoing support. It has been almost six years since I started Creativerly, and I am already looking forward to many more years writing and maintaining it. It is a joy seeing the site grow and publishing content on a regular basis. My backlog of apps I want to write deep dives about is full and ready for 2025. I am excited for what is ahead. To wrap up the year, I am excited to share Creativerly‘s favorite apps of 2024. I started this little content series already in 2021, and since then gathered all the apps that became my favorites or stood out to me throughout the past 12 months. It is my own way to thank the creative minds building and developing those apps, and highlighting their great work. Enjoy this last post of the year. I wish everyone a great start into 2025, and I am looking forward to another exciting 12 months writing and maintaining Creativerly.
Creativerly‘s Favourite Apps of 2024After 2021, 2022, and 2023, it is yet again time to wrap up the year for Creativerly by gathering my most favorite apps of 2024 and the ones that stood out to me throughout the past twelve months. I have been writing about, researching, and exploring apps and software at Creativerly for almost six years, however my interest in the world of apps started even earlier. In a world where loads of people are constantly hunting for the perfect tool and finding themselves in a cycle of adoption and abandonment, I am striving for simplicity, I am striving for simple and lightweight apps that help me getting my stuff done and are joyful to use. I have also been affected by the shiny app syndrome, jumping back and forth between different apps, and experiencing the urge to try out every single new note-taking app which entered the market. But after I realized what truly matters to me when chosing a note-taking app, I tried to apply the same tactics and principles to other apps and workflows too. This gave me the possibility to reflect on all the apps I use, and it made me stick to a lot of them, although I previously felt the urge to replace them and try out something new. I managed to say goodbye to half-life productivity software and embrace my current toolstack. I am now a bit more cautious when it comes to adding new apps to my workflows, however, I still love exploring, researching, and writing about them. And on that note, enjoy this year's Creativerly's Favourite Apps. Read the whole post here:
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Fresh Updates & NewsAs the year comes to an end, Capacities shipped an exciting new update packed with a lot of stuff. First and foremost, the anticipated tablet app is now available to everyone. This was in the works for a while and exclusively available as a beta to subscribers of Capacities' Believer Plan. However, now everyone can head to the iOS App Store or Google Play Store on their tablet devices and download the app. When it comes to the design and functionalities, the tablet app sits right between the desktop app and mobile app, but it brings many powerful features from the desktop app in a more mobile-like and simplified UI. Besides that, Capacities is now offering true cross-platforms availability as you are now able to download Capacities for Windows and Linux too. Capacities is now available for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, Android, Windows, Linux, and as a web app. Amazing. Anyway, this end-of-year update goes even further as it introduces three new experimental languages, which are French, Spanish, and Hungarian. On the design side, all uses of text labels throughout the app have been reworked to feature uniform spacing and constant proportions, no matter what size they are. The right side panel also received a little treatment to allow better management of various entries with a dynamic stack of elements alongside locked or permanent elements. The primary color blue has been removed from the app, as the whole app is already colorful and the focus is intended to be on the content rather than UI elements. Head over to the link above to check out all the release notes of this huge update, as they are many more improvements that got shipped recently. Play is exciting tool that has received constant updates and improvements throughout the last 12 months. Most notably is the big Play 2.0 update which allows users to bring all their ideas to life with high fidelity interactions that are rendered with the same tech as a finished mobile app. This big update included exciting features like Interaction Prefabs, which are pre-fabricated, read-made interactions to use in your projects, Variable, Conditions, Animate and Delay, new Triggers and Actions, UI updates, and a lot more. You are even able to share your native prototypes by leveraging Apple's App Clip technology. Besides that, you can bring your designs over from Figma by simply copying and pasting them into Play. There were even more amazing updates, so make sure to check out the linked blog post above. As Play focused in 2024 mostly on interaction design and giving users the powerful tools they need to bring their product ideas to life, 2025 will be the year during which the team at Play will start working on more ways for teams to work together, while also continuing to add exciting updates in the area of interaction design.
Mental Wealth❯ The next era of design is intent-driven – “This morning, Google gave me the weather, Manchester United’s stats, and stock performance — each in a dynamic, interactive format. No clicks, just answers. As a designer, this made me wonder: How did we evolve from basic ’10 blue links’ to these intelligent, context-aware interfaces?” ❯ Quiet Leadership: The Superpower the World Needs Right Now – “In a world that often rewards the loudest voices and boldest proclamations, quiet leadership can feel like an anomaly. We’ve been conditioned to equate confidence with volume, decisiveness with domination, and success with center-stage charisma. But as the modern workplace grapples with burnout, disconnection, and overcompetitive environments, the subtle strengths of quiet leaders—and their mastery of inner leadership—are more essential than ever.” ❯ Crabs, Creativity, and the Endless Cycle of Imitation – “On a recent walk with a friend, we found ourselves musing on nature and creative direction. As we wandered through the city, the conversation turned to her time studying biomedical engineering. She recalled a particularly interesting lesson on carcinisation—the evolutionary process where different species independently evolve into crab-like forms.” ❯ I (still) don’t know what “craft” means – “The industry is in flux. Designers are out of work for months, desperately trying to understand why their applications for jobs are ghosted, maintaining databases of applications just to keep tabs on the volume of rejections, being put through rounds and rounds and rounds of interviews, and yet we’re still seeing companies continue to hire at pace.”
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❯ Quick Bits
Till next time! 👋 Support: Do you have a friend who is looking for inspiration, news about design, and useful tools and apps? Forward this newsletter to a friend or simply share this issue and show some support. You can also show some love by simply clicking the button down below and keep this newsletter a sustainable side-project by buying me a coffee. ☕️ 🥰
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