What struck me last night was that most of the people, including the monzo employees appeared to be still in school…
or maybe I’m getting old?
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Facebook release notes are crap too.
‘We update our app every two weeks, for no reason other than piss you off.’
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Here’s a good (IMHO) iOS release note:
It’s got some personality and they put some effort into it. And its all about the update they’ve made to their app.
On an unrelated note, I wonder how much they’re paying Amazon to license their one-click purchase patent…
And how many times do you think that was shared on social media?
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I do not like it, it should be like this one here from LinkedIn.
Simple and straight to the point… none of this fun stuff that everyone likes and what makes Monzo Different from everyone else.
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Probably none. But how “viral” have Monzo release notes really been, beyond Mantham Dave and his 250 followers? I count a tiny handful of mentions.
I chose Monzo because it had good features and a good iOS app. Not because I saw some random fella sharing Monzo “release bantz” on Twitter.
In fact that would have put me off.
When you put your own actual money into the product of a new startup you want to be sure they’re not just a bunch of social media funsters.
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Yeah man I agree with you I mean who the hell wants their app going viral jeez I mean if I was starting out I would not want all that attention and those people downloading my app, I’d rather pay loads of money for my marketing etc.
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Multiply that by the number of releases, then by the number of times that Monzo’s going to increase the size of it’s user base & you’ll hopefully appreciate the significance.
That’s fine. As you’ve acknowledged, perhaps these notes aren’t tailored by someone like yourself. I’m sure you understand that others will be attracted to Monzo for different reasons.
Ok.
Fortunately it doesn’t seem to have concerned 300k plus users.
Anyway, I’ve lost interest in this conversation I’m afraid 
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There’s “good viral” and “bad viral” from a marketing PoV.
“Good viral” carefully slips in all the USPs of your app so when people are entertained by the content they also learn why they want to use your product.
“Bad viral” neglects to mention anything positive about your app, and may actually make it look a bit insignificant:
But hey, all PR is good PR, right?
Wow! Awesome in that case, I will shut up 
Our devs are only capable of writting complaints…
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Re-reading the original post, I think the thing to take from it is that whilst all of the witty text is fine, just make it a little easier to see what has been included in the release. Perhaps in bullet points at the end or something?
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What’s unclear about the release note?
I’m not saying there is anything unclear about them. It was my interpretation of the original post, from re-reading the post and the screenshot @anon40779440 included.
Well they can’t just say “We implemented new voice recognition support so we can silently listen-in while you’ve got the app open to serve you better advertising”… 
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Trainline.com does something similar and nobody is complaining:
If you’re not happy with the release notes despite the app and service being good then there isn’t much left to say… I guess you can go back to a legacy bank. 
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It’s only because I love Monzo that I take the time to give feedback like this.
Have said my piece and now excuse me while I fetch my old tweed jacket… 
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Another company that does great release notes is CityMapper, it’s almost a joy to see them release an update just to see what they’ve said. (It does seem like they put less effort in these days, but have a look back at their release history for some genuinely funny updates.)
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They will love the feed back - well played for being super honest -
I’ll rephrase my question, which part of the release note is a self-referential in joke?
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I’m not a fan of big pile of text, though I don’t perceive them negatively. I’m a fan of bulleted lists 
. Jokes intricacies sometimes escape foreigners, so I feel like I miss out a bit and have to try a bit harder, but I’m not butthurt about it.
Ideal notes - Dwarf Fortress! Bullet points, functional, and still pretty hilarious. I appreciate that Banking doesn’t have much chance to reference as many funny elements as DF can, but something similar would be ideal. For Android though, please! 
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/changelog_page.php
And some random selection:
Dwarf children die from embarassment at not being dressed at age 2
Weasels probably shouldn’t be found on glaciers
Undead cat can adopt dwarf
Serpent Men can Kick
Fat dwarves eating causes lag
Dwarf tries to clean missing body part
Animals all try to graze from pasture’s top left corner, starvation ensues
Social skill gains by attending parties is off the charts
Animals get attached to clothes they’re wearing
We should make a challenge, iOS team vs Android team, battle about release notes. Setup a poll, ask people to vote. 
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If we’re debating about release notes, I would recommend reading the ones Citymapper (https://appsto.re/gb/ce3-B.i) does. It always makes me chuckle when I read it- it’s both entertaining and informative. If an app says “bug fixes and performance improvement” on every update, why even bother reading to find out what’s new? I know we have an active forum, but I like reading the update notes.
Here are some choice examples from Citymapper (under summary to prevent it from taking up a ton of space). Imo they are getting less and less creative with them but I hope they don’t stop!:
Summary
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