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Hello Reader,

Thanks for being here for a second week of Spells for Systems.

I received a bit of feedback from my first issue and have made some changes including:

• Emoji to help you tell different media apart
• Shorter intro and video summaries
• Add in summaries for blog posts and podcast episode

If you have ideas on improving this weekly digest (or things that irk you), please send me your feedback.

Let's dive into what happened during the week of October 14, 2024:

📣 The week's Notion updates

Last week Notion made the following announcement:

• ​Notion has acquired Aquarium, an AI retrieval company. To understand what that means, watch this video by Tool Finder (not an official Notion video)
• The UI of databases has been improved for better alignment

🎞️ This week's YouTube videos

​Curious about Notion AI? Watch it create content live, Nicky Saunders (1h36)
​
Want to see someone use Notion AI to generate social media captions and a YouTube script from a single image? This is the video for you. The second half of the video is a different segment about ChatGPT.

​Finally create client portals for Notion (best method 2024), Matthias Franck (53 minutes)

This is a demo of how Softr and Notion work together to create a portal that lets your clients see only the data relevant to them, without needing access to the full database. It looks very promising.

​I am the bottleneck, Sara Loretta (11 minutes)

A quick look at the automation Sara puts in place to help reply to all the emails. It uses Zapier, ChatGPT to analyse emails, draft replies and add tasks to her calendar.

​Simplify Your ENTIRE Notion Workspace in 15 Minutes (using Science), Productive Setups (15 minutes)

​Speed coding a Notion integration for my productivity app (mini weekend hackathon w/ friends 👨‍💻), Chris Raroque

Watch Chris Raroque and his friends build an Ellie and Notion integration in a weekend. A cool way to see what a mini Notion hackathon can look like. *Spoiler alert*: The integration works, two ways.

​Gamify Your Task List? | A Fun Approach to Productivity with Notion (Step-by-Step Tutorial), The Organized Notebook

The title pretty much says it all. It's a tutorial. 90% of the video are screenshots explaining how and why to set up a gamified Notion task database.

🎙️ Podcasts worth a listen

• ​Community-led growth, Kabir's Tech Dives (6 minutes)
• ​Why so many users love Notion | Reddit Users, Kabir's Tech Dive (7 minutes)

📇 Blog posts published last week

​Mastering Project Management in Notion: The Key Functionalities You Need to Use, Mona, ManagerHack

This article takes you step-by-step from the must-know beginner functions all the way to advanced features so you can slowly build your databases and know which property of function to try next as you get comfortable with Notion features. In other words, start simple and leave things like integrations to later.

​How Notion uses Progressive Disclosure on the Notion AI Page, Franklina Amoah

What is progressive disclosure? Franklina explains that Notion's AI shows you less and expands as you need more options.

​Inspiring conversations with Josh Redd of Notion State, Voyage KC

An overview of Josh Redd's journey. His story highlights the growth of his Notion consulting business from serving solopreneurs to becoming Notion's preferred partner for large Enterprise customers. As Josh wisely notes, "Obsession is a great indicator of potential for success."

​Automating note-taking: Onyx Boox to Notion with OCR and AI summarization, Michal Wlosik

This is very advanced stuff. If you want to be able to take hand written notes, have them analysed (by ChatGPT) and then added top your Notion workspace, this step-by-step will take you there. The only caveat is that you need to take notes with Onyx Boox, but I think this process could probably work with other handwriting tablets like Remarkable, Kindle Scribe or Supernote Nomad.

​Notion vs. NotebookLM: What’s the Best AI Note-Taking Tool?, Danny Maiorca, Make Use Of

An in-depth comparison of Notion and NotebookLM. Everything is reviewed, from the user experience to the quality of the results from the prompts used. Notion wins because of its user-friendliness, note customisation, integrations, and non-AI features.

💬 Interesting conversations on Reddit

• ​Has anyone put Notion on their walls?​
• ​Notion is overrated?​
• ​Let’s be honest about Notion AI​
• ​If your Notion is unorganized, don't blame it on Notion, blame it on you​
• ​Fallen out of love with Notion​​

📆 Upcoming events

• ​How to Build Purpose-Driven Notion Workspaces by Workcraft Labs, October 22, 1 pm EST (free, online)
• ​Make with Notion, October 24, San Francisco (in-person conference is sold out, free virtual sessions still open for registration)
• All other Notion community events are listed here​