Do Users Want Innovation?
This is a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately. When a product reaches maturity, meaning it works as designed (mostly), the ugly bugs are resolved and you’ve got a good number of users, inevitably, as a product team, you begin planning for new features. Most of the time, your initial release doesn’t include [...]
I’m Not a Doctor
Paul dropped a great analogy today when he compared product managers to doctors. I love a good analogy, and this one is gold, at least when applied to sustaining a product. Plus, it’s funny when you inject a little Hollywood into it. When you’re not feeling well, you go to a doctor and explain what [...]
IE6 Death Rattle
Last week, Digg became the first major web site to end support for IE6, or at least, support for certain functions in IE6. Today, it looks like YouTube may be the next. This should come as no surprise, since the anti-IE6 movement has been in full voice for quite some time. What’s interesting is the [...]
Inertia and Separation Anxiety Drive Design
This article about reluctance among users to give up Outlook as their mail client of choice underscores an issue that everyone in product design/development faces. People hate change, especially at work. When it comes to computers, most people have a very low tolerance threshold for failure, even if the service or web app is free. [...]
On Product Management
I’ve been in software product management for about ten years now. Connect, my latest product, has reached a critical stage in its life. It’s the first product I’ve managed from its inception, so I’m getting interesting new experience as it grows. It’s pretty robust and has most of the big features people need in a [...]
Twitter’s #fixreplies Boo-Boo
Update: Twitter founder Biz Stone has posted exactly the explanation we (all 3% of us) wanted, and I completely understand the hurry to rush out without fully thinking through the loud ramifications of the squeaky 3%. Kudos. You’ve probably heard about the Twitter @replies fiasco by now. Marshall has a good recap and explanation of [...]
