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Why is complexity easier to charge for than simplicity? Is it because consumers mistake accidental complexity with real complexity? Does simplicity make a produ

by sofal 18y ago

Why is complexity easier to charge for than simplicity? Is it because consumers mistake accidental complexity with real complexity? Does simplicity make a product or service appear of less worth?

davidw 18y ago
It's easy to make a big chart with lots of features and checkboxes. "Look, we have more than the competition!".
mdasen 18y ago
Because when people see complexity, they assume it was difficult to program. When someone sees simplicity, they assume that's just how computers work. For example, how does Google work? It's an incredibly complicated problem, but Google puts a nice front-end on it that makes it all look like that's just how computers work. In my job capacity, I often have to create custom search applications. As a whole of the project, this is given very little time and money. What is given time and money are incredibly complex interfaces with lots of options. I have to assume this is because a search interface often has one (or a small number) of inputs (therefore is easy) while an interface dealing with categorization on multiple facets, tags, etc. has lots of complexity (therefore being hard). Simplicity is hard to charge for because it looks easy. When something looks easy, we don't value it highly. Basically, we understand the work that went into cludgy, complex interfaces because we see it. We* don't understand the complexity of something simple like Google. *The "we" is meant to be the public, not really people on news.yc.
briancooley 18y ago
I think that, in part, it is related to the consumer's natural preference to keep his options open. A big part of making something simple is to decide things for the user. At first glance, the user is likely to prefer the item with all the bells and whistles, even if he never rings those bells or blows those whistles. I think it takes a lot of effort and courage from the designer to decide some - and hopefully the right - things for the user knowing that the risk is to provide a product that might not meet every user's needs. The timid and lazy will push the decision and effort off on the user.
Tamerlin 18y ago
That's an excellent question, and you've already received a few good responses, but here's my view :) The answer to your second and third questions are both "yes." A lot of developers take pride in building complex software. Bad developers do it because they just shut up and code, and turn software that should be simple into a giant pile of fragile spaghetti code. That leads to a high maintenance overhead, so adding features becomes a lot more labor intensive than it would be with a good piece of software... hence higher cost.

by sofal 18y ago

Why is complexity easier to charge for than simplicity? Is it because consumers mistake accidental complexity with real complexity? Does simplicity make a product or service appear of less worth?

davidw 18y ago

It's easy to make a big chart with lots of features and checkboxes. "Look, we have more than the competition!".

mdasen 18y ago

Because when people see complexity, they assume it was difficult to program. When someone sees simplicity, they assume that's just how computers work. For example, how does Google work? It's an incredibly complicated problem, but Google puts a nice front-end on it that makes it all look like that's just how computers work. In my job capacity, I often have to create custom search applications. As a whole of the project, this is given very little time and money. What is given time and money are incredibly complex interfaces with lots of options. I have to assume this is because a search interface often has one (or a small number) of inputs (therefore is easy) while an interface dealing with categorization on multiple facets, tags, etc. has lots of complexity (therefore being hard). Simplicity is hard to charge for because it looks easy. When something looks easy, we don't value it highly. Basically, we understand the work that went into cludgy, complex interfaces because we see it. We* don't understand the complexity of something simple like Google. *The "we" is meant to be the public, not really people on news.yc.

briancooley 18y ago

I think that, in part, it is related to the consumer's natural preference to keep his options open. A big part of making something simple is to decide things for the user. At first glance, the user is likely to prefer the item with all the bells and whistles, even if he never rings those bells or blows those whistles. I think it takes a lot of effort and courage from the designer to decide some - and hopefully the right - things for the user knowing that the risk is to provide a product that might not meet every user's needs. The timid and lazy will push the decision and effort off on the user.

Tamerlin 18y ago

That's an excellent question, and you've already received a few good responses, but here's my view :) The answer to your second and third questions are both "yes." A lot of developers take pride in building complex software. Bad developers do it because they just shut up and code, and turn software that should be simple into a giant pile of fragile spaghetti code. That leads to a high maintenance overhead, so adding features becomes a lot more labor intensive than it would be with a good piece of software... hence higher cost.