Technology Shakedown

David Berlind recently started a new podcast series entitled "Technology Shakedown". In it, he exposes technology that isn't as good as it could be. He talks about products that work great 80% of the time, but provides major headaches the other 20% - when the average user can't figure out why the product is misbehaving and must spend time concocting convoluted workarounds. A much better description can be found here.

Apple has rebuilt it's business capitalizing on the shortfalls of mediocre technology products. A superior experience is the reason people will shell out $150 for an iPod compared to $30 for a generic MP3 player. And it's the same reason Apple can charge a premium for a Mac compared to the average Windows computer. People love Apple because their products simply work the way they're supposed to - making their users lives more productive and enjoyable. Why more product managers don't comprehend this is beyond me.

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The discovery of this series dovetails nicely with my post yesterday about Rails. It not that I don't appreciate all the functionality Rails provides, but I'm finding myself tinkering with aspects of the codebase that should work out of the box - and it's hurting my productivity.

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