6 ms·

Multiple dimensions. The common theme why people get confused about "superior" products not winning boils down to ignoring the multiple dimensions of quality.

• baddox 9y ago
  I agree with everything you said, but you can also go too far in that direction of analysis. If you let the empirical gain in traction to sneak in as a factor in your analysis, you effectively have a tautology, and you lose all predictive power, similar to the misuse of the phrase “survival of the fittest,” where you conclude that variant A was “clearly” more “fit” than variant B because A survived and B didn’t. It’s still important to recognize that a variant might “win” because of factors completely unrelated to its “fitness,” like an organization using its market power in an unrelated sector to promote its variant, or even just good old fashioned dumb luck.
  • doiwin 9y ago
    So how do we decide if qwerty or dvorak is fitter?
    • ghaff 9y ago
      Well,you try to design a test of typing speed and fatigue but it's very challenging because all your subjects are probably already familiar with qwerty keyboards even if they don't touch-type. And then you conclude abstract fitness is irrelevant anyway because everyone uses qwerty and there are: - Advantages in everyone using more or less the same thing - No way you're going to make everyone incur huge costs and switch
    • baddox 9y ago
      Ideally, by recording (as best you can, and estimating after that) the cost per unit time of using a non-standard keyboard layout (including the cost of learning it and the cost of occasionally needing to use computers that don’t use it) and the benefit per unit time of using that layout. Either the benefit per unit time eventually surpasses the cost per unit time (since some costs are fixed, namely the initial learning), or it doesn’t. Only switch if benefit surpasses cost in a time window you’re comfortable with.
    • baddox 9y ago
      I realize now that my first response only addresses how an individual might ideally decide whether to switch to Dvorak. Deciding which layout is “fitter” across the globe (or whichever language regions currently use QWERTY and can feasibly use Dvorak) is a much more difficult cost/benefit analysis in practice. To calculate cost, you would need to look at the costs of mass manufacturing new keyboards and/or patching and distributing the software that drives keyboard input. To calculate benefits, you would need to do large scale studies on the speed/productivity benefits of Dvorak over QWERTY, both for first-time learners and switchers. Heck, you’d even need to estimate the political costs (for governments, large corporations, standards bodies, etc.) of persuading the change, as well as the unavoidable costs of having both layouts exist in the wild during the transition period. This is so daunting that it feels nearly impossible, and indeed, I suspect any rigorous cost/benefit analysis would show that the benefits of any new layout (even the technically best layout) is not worth the costs of switching away from any single ubiquitous standard (even the technically worst layout imaginable), at least not in any reasonable time frame. My guess is that the best approach is to maintain one ubiquitous standard, and change it very gradually, and to gradually reduce the costs, e.g. by implementing easy layout-switching software in major operating systems, or even bolder approaches like supporting virtualization/containerization of personal software settings and development environments in major operating systems. What if I could just sit down at any modern networked PC, type in a URL and some authentication, and immediately be running my own exact customized computing/development environment, complete with my keyboard layout, text editor, development dependencies, etc.? That would be awesome. As long as the hardware keyboard layout is roughly compatible with my software settings (and I don’t rely on printed labels on the physical keyboard), most of the costs of choosing a keyboard layout (other than the fixed costs of learning it) go away.
• rainbowmverse 9y ago
  I saw this recently when a small but vocal portion of early federated social network users complained that the "inferior" Mastodon was gaining so much traction. They only saw it in terms of technical features and seniority, oblivious to its main draw: a welcoming user and development community for marginalized people. Most of the early users and developers were (and continue to be) LTBTQ+ people, and the project leader (Eugen) was 100% welcoming. In a world where we don't get much that's for us, it's nice to have a thing where we're well-represented. When I tried the previous attempts at federated social networks, they seemed to match the general demographics of tech. The predominantly white, male, straight, cisgender population wasn't exactly unwelcoming, but I didn't feel comfortable talking about some topics. It wasn't any better than Twitter in that sense. And then we got content warnings and per-toot privacy levels. The possibly technically superior predecessors didn't stand a chance.
• pjmlp 9y ago
  Actually if you research the story of the bicycle, it was a failure that took over one century until people started to realise how it could be useful, without killing themselves in the process.
• pdfernhout 9y ago
  Well put, as far as your point goes on positive aspects of multidimensional valuation. There is another aspect of these multiple dimensions that has little to do with positive product quality as most people perceive it, unfortunately. Capital (fiscal or social) spent on advertising, free samples, dumping, bribery of reviewers, lobbying about legislation, questionable lawsuits about patents and copyrights (e.g. SCO's zombie FUD lawsuit), hiring competitor's employees, establishing strategic partnerships, loss leaders, outright theft, and so on can distort outcomes so the lower quality products wins in the marketplace -- and thus the rich get richer. I have seen that in the computing field. with, say, how Java won over Smalltalk (by engaging IBM's marketing muscle). Or how Windows won over CP/M and QNX (again, IBM's marketing muscles and more). Or how EFI won over Open Firmware (Intel's marketing muscle). Such "successes" can then lead to establishing monopolies with social networking effects which become self sustaining -- even if the origins may be questionable: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2004/9/13/lawsuit-threatens-to-close-facebook-mark/ http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2004/9/13/lawsuit-threaten... "According to the complaint in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, ConnectU LLC, formed by Divya K. Narendra ’04, Cameron S. H. Winklevoss ’04 and Tyler O. H. Winklevoss ’04, is seeking damages for Zuckerberg’s alleged theft of their idea — then called Harvard Connection — and his subsequent deception." See also for Bill Gates' success based on other's source code: https://patch.com/california/losaltos/microsoft-co-founder-paul-allen-recounts-his-days-of-7a8784789a https://patch.com/california/losaltos/microsoft-co-founder-p... "That phase of Allen's life involved taking the bus–sports coat, tie, leather briefcase and all—down to the offices of local computer gurus. "I would boost Bill into dumpsters and we'd get these coffee-stained texts (of computer code)" from behind the offices, grinned Allen." And: "MS-DOS paternity suit settled: Computer pioneer Kildall vindicated, from beyond the grave" http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/30/msdos_paternity_suit_resolved/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/30/msdos_paternity_suit... And it helps to start rich, of course: http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/ http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/ "William Henry Gates III made his best decision on October 28, 1955, the night he was born. He chose J.W. Maxwell as his great-grandfather. Maxwell founded Seattle's National City Bank in 1906. His son, James Willard Maxwell was also a banker and established a million-dollar trust fund for William (Bill) Henry Gates III. In some of the later lessons, you will be encouraged to take entrepreneurial risks. You may find it comforting to remember that at any time you can fall back on a trust fund worth many millions of 1998 dollars." Contrast all that with the hypocritical: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Letter_to_Hobbyists https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Letter_to_Hobbyists "As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software. Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid Is this fair? One thing you don't do by stealing software is get back at MITS for some problem you may have had. MITS doesn't make money selling software. The royalty paid to us, the manual, the tape and the overhead make it a break-even operation. One thing you do do is prevent good software from being written. Who can afford to do professional work for nothing? What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free?" So says the millionaire dumpster diver who could afford to write free software his whole life. Hypocritical to anyone who knows more of the story, but brilliant marketing! Including the rhetorical deception about how much time free software developers might have (including ones at universities or government labs or students like, then, Linus Torvalds). The extension of copyright duration and scope by Disney and others uses the courts to suppress possibly better free alternatives to paid media. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/35811012/why-star-trek-makers-are-suing-fan-fiction-writers http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/35811012/why-star-trek... Even for cars, the purchase and destruction of light rail across the country by companies who stood to benefit from selling more cars was a factor (but not the only one) in the car's ascendance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp... Leaded gas was known from the start to be harmful, yet money talked on that too including to misleadingly point the finger at lead paint instead of leaded gas for so much criminal behavior -- leading to a century of suffering and all sorts of external costs to society. http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure-gasoline-crime-increase-children-health/ http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure... Further, the infrastructure for bicycling in the USA was never developed in a way like, say, the Netherlands -- and that is a political choice affecting the desirability of product use. Marijuana and hemp (easily grown almost anywhere) in general became criminalized in part due to profits to be made by selling alternatives for tree-based paper and oil-based pharmaceuticals and remained criminalized because of campaign donations related to profits from maintaining prisons (e.g. why NY's clearly harmful Rockefeller drugs laws were supported for so long by so many legislators with prisons in their districts). Most heart surgery like stents in most cases is basically a scam at $50K+ a pop compared to dietary changes (where nutritional advice and support offer little profit to hospitals and doctors): https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/health/heart-disease-stents.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/health/heart-disease-sten... https://www.drfuhrman.com/learn/library/articles/53/for-stable-heart-disease-does-stent-placement-do-more-harm-than-good https://www.drfuhrman.com/learn/library/articles/53/for-stab... The entire medical profession was distorted in many ways by this application of big money a century ago to disrupt a focus on lifestyle and nutrition and shift the focus to drugs prescriptions and procedures: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report There are quite a few financially successful drugs and procedures which are based on questionable science and ethics -- but tremendously successful marketing operations. The same goes for food. The truth is increasingly coming out about refined sugar as poison: https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2017/11/409116/sugar-industry-suppressed-evidence-health-risks-sucrose https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2017/11/409116/sugar-industry-supp... "If Project 259s findings had been disclosed, sucrose would likely have been scrutinized as a potential carcinogen, the authors said." But rather than make such findings public, the Sugar industry paid money to shift the blame to fat: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/13/well/eat/how-the-sugar-industry-shifted-blame-to-fat.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/13/well/eat/how-the-sugar-in... "The sugar industry paid scientists in the 1960s to play down the link between sugar and heart disease and promote saturated fat as the culprit instead, newly released historical documents show. The internal sugar industry documents, recently discovered by a researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, and published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine, suggest that five decades of research into the role of nutrition and heart disease, including many of today’s dietary recommendations, may have been largely shaped by the sugar industry. “They were able to derail the discussion about sugar for decades,” said Stanton Glantz, a professor of medicine at U.C.S.F. and an author of the JAMA Internal Medicine paper." Or in general: http://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/columnists/monique-keiran-four-food-groups-or-four-lobby-groups-1.9804711 http://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/columnists/monique-keir... "One popular television journalist quipped that the four food groups should be renamed “the four lobby groups.”" The food lobbyists (especially the dairy industry) were very good at getting propaganda into schools by supplying free "educational" literature. The schooling industry itself also delivers a monopolistic product with many bad qualities: "The Underground History of American Education: A School Teacher's Intimate Investigation Into the Problem of Modern Schooling" https://archive.org/details/TheUndergroundHistoryOfAmericanEducation_758 https://archive.org/details/TheUndergroundHistoryOfAmericanE... An even deeper question regarding foods, games, online, and other products and services is designing them to have an addictive nature as part of how companies get people hooked on stuff that is harmful for them. Examples: https://www.naturalnews.com/021949_tobacco_smoking_health.html https://www.naturalnews.com/021949_tobacco_smoking_health.ht... https://www.npr.org/sections/monkeysee/2012/11/27/165989232/is-that-a-budweiser-in-your-hand-product-placement-booze-and-denzel-washington https://www.npr.org/sections/monkeysee/2012/11/27/165989232/... https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ethics-everyone/201202/facebook-addiction https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ethics-everyone/201202/... https://www.polygon.com/2014/7/28/5930685/love-child-interview-ethics-game-design https://www.polygon.com/2014/7/28/5930685/love-child-intervi... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernormal_Stimuli https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernormal_Stimuli Unregulated or misregulated businesses (including non-profits and government-run businesses) will privatize gains and socialize costs and risks whenever possible (including costs and risks to consumers and societies of using inferior products). So, while you are 100% right to look at multiple dimensions in saying why some products succeed, some of those dimensions can be pretty ugly.
• scholia 9y ago
  There's a much better framework for understanding this stuff in the concept of the Whole Product. The Whole Product is not just the core product. You have to add on all the things like reliability, service and support (the expected product), its expansion capabilities (the augmented product), and its potential for future development (the potential product) to get "the whole product". If you just look at the core product, you are very likely to go wrong, because having a technologically superior core product does not mean you have a better Whole Product. (See cassette tape vs DAT, Windows vs OS/2 and many more.) The Whole Product concept was popularized by Geoffrey Moore in Crossing the Chasm and Inside the Tornado, which were seminal books at places like Netscape. Before that, the key idea was TAM, the Technology Adoption Model, pioneered by Professor Everett Rogers in Diffusion of Innovations in 1962.
  • jasode 9y ago
    >The Whole Product concept was popularized by Geoffrey Moore in Crossing the Chasm I see the value in Geoffrey Moore's framework. There are similar analysis frameworks. One is MCDA (multi-criteria decision framework)[1] and another is SWOT Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities Threats[2]. There must be a dozen others. But I would still generalize them down to "multiple dimensions" because one can use it for non-commercial products sold for free such as comparing GCC vs Clang/LLVM -- or -- compare non-specific products such as "categories of products". An example of comparing multi-dimensions of categories such as "live theater" vs "movies". Without GM's book and his framework, if we see someone say that "GCC is superior to Clang because it targets more cpus than Clang and the resultant binaries of LAME MP3 and FFMpeg compiled by GCC have better performance", it means the commenter is leaving out other dimensions to support his conclusion of GCC superiority. By omitting the missing dimensions, the observation that Clang/LLVM is winning over GCC in the "marketplace of ideas" seems totally illogical. But once one adds in additional dimensions such as Clang not forcing a GNU license and/or Clang exposing the AST parse tree, its adoption makes more sense. Same for categories like "theater vs movies". When movies first came out, some experts believed that films would be a fad because "audiences want to see _real_ actors in person and not some _artificial_ projection on a screen". The experts were only focused on one dimension: the appeal of the audience being in the same physical space as the actors. They ignored all the other positive dimensions that films allow such as closeups on actors faces. (E.g. a live stage play's script can't rely on very subtle facial responses such as an eyebrow raise or a tiny smirk of the lips because anybody beyond the 3rd row won't even see it. Stage dialogue with whispers can't be real whispers, they have to very loud and very fake stage whispers. Films also allow alternating time and location cutting for storytelling. But live Broadway theater is also still around -- because it has quality dimensions some people prefer.) A lot of arguments on the forums about X being superior to Y are really people favoring different dimensions and then talking past each other. Since people can't agree on all the dimensions/criteria to consider and how to weigh them, the debates remain unresolved. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple-criteria_decision_analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple-criteria_decision_ana... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis
• canjobear 9y ago
  It's true that in most cases if one thing beats another, you can find some dimension on which the winner was superior. But it isn't necessarily true in all cases. If it is the case that sometimes things win only due to entrenchment or random network effects, then there may be some cases where the winner is strictly worse than the loser, though these cases will be rare. If you found one, though, it would be the strongest possible evidence that sometimes markets/evolution/whatever don't pick the best thing. The OP is asking for those examples.
• notthemessiah 9y ago
  Perfect example is how the OP say goes so far to say bat lungs are better (because they are more efficient as they have more surface area per volume) but they also are seemingly more fragile: suffering barotrauma from extreme changes in pressure: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14593-wind-turbines-make-bat-lungs-explode/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14593-wind-turbines-m.... > Baerwald and her colleagues believe that birds do not suffer the same fate as bats – the majority of birds are killed by direct contact with the blades – because their lungs are more rigid than those of bats and therefore more resistant to sudden changes in pressure.
• ygaf 9y ago
  Every factor can be captured, but can we agree what isn't superiority? e.g. buying an ipad (vs a samsung tablet or whatever) to be the same as everyone else, is not a reflection of the virtues of the ipad. I would say the (simpler) winning product in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15776047 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15776047 has true superiority because it can be perceived by anyone in a vacuum.
• cyberpunk0 9y ago
  Mostly marketing more often than not. Money and greed get what the want at the expense of others
• revelation 9y ago
  This is a terrifically bad example to choose given the trillions of dollars invested in building roads and general infrastructure that make cars viable in the first place. It is pretty clear now that cars are decidedly not the best solution to transport. It just so happened that they scaled the best, and now everything is designed around them. It's just macro vs micro and hardly has anything to do with the product.