This recent article in Wired, which suggests that now technologies just need to be ‘good enough’ to be a mainstream success. Examples given range from the Flip video camera, Skype and MP3. Another piece in the same issue discusses the Craig’s List phenomenon to which similar logic can be applied.
It reminded me of Geoffrey Moore’s Crossing the Chasm (wikipedia summary) where he analyses the Technology Adoption Lifecycle and propounds the existence of a chasm between the innovators/early adopters and the early majority – where the real money is made by any technology product.
The reasons given for the chasm’s existence is that whilst the innovators and early adopters will be happy with the rough edges of a disruptively innovative product (citing the Pareto principle or 80/20 rule) the rest of the market want something that offers ‘the whole product’. Apple’s iPod is a perfect example of this in fact. The iPod was a disruptive innovation that keen Mac fans flocked to but very few other people – you could make it work with a PC but it wasn’t easy. At launch it was a standalone product. One of the things that made the iPod a mass-market success was the whole product offering – Apple’s own iTunes and the enormous eco-system that exists around it offering cases and all manner of accessories.
That was the early part of this century. Have things changed so much that ‘good enough’ is fine with more than those on the bleeding edge? Or are the examples in the Wired article successes because they get the the very core of what is important to everybody and not bother with the unnecessary parts that cater purely to the aficionado? Perhaps we could even question whether some of these products have even reached the early majority stage of their lifecycle yet. Plenty of people use Skype but the potential market is many times larger.
How has the Flip camera changed since its introduction? Has it added in-camera effects? Are there 12 models to choose from? No – that’s what a traditional consumer electronics company would do. The Flip has avoided feature-creep as much as possible and continuing to address a core need, only increasing specs when this could be achieved without significantly altering the value proposition of the product.
It seems to me that true mass-market commercial success nowadays comes not from winning the specifications war but in having the easiest-to-use product and this can only be a good thing.
Photo credit: karenwithak
