Ask HN: Want to set the position for my product, but I don't know where I stand?
A developer of a "Skimming" tool for chatting with PDFs and videos is pivoting to a unified feed that transcribes and summarizes YouTube, newsletters, and X posts. Users could read summaries instead of watching long videos, then ask follow-up questions. They ask HN if they'd pay ~$10/month for it and what creators they'd subscribe to.
Background
The poster is a solo builder who launched "Skimming" in 2024 — a tool that started as "chat with PDF/images/videos" (letting users ask questions about uploaded documents and media) and later added chatbot creation features. The core problem: they feel their product is drifting into a crowded space (site chatbots) they don't want to compete in, so they're asking HN for help defining a clearer positioning and ideal customer profile (ICP).
The key context: The specific pivot they describe — subscribing to YouTube playlists/channels, auto-transcribing new videos, generating summaries, and letting users chat with the content — is essentially an AI-powered information diet tool. It competes in a growing space of "second-brain" or "AI research assistant" products (e.g., NotebookLM, Mem, Fireflies, Snipd, various YouTube summarizers). HN readers are an ideal audience for this kind of question: they're technically sophisticated early adopters who will give blunt, honest feedback and have strong opinions about tooling, pricing ($10/mo), and feature priorities.
The post is not an article but an "Ask HN" — a community thread where founders directly solicit feedback.