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The purpose of innovation is only to relieve pain? Seems rather bleak. And if we don't know that we have the problem, how are we supposed to find out besides s

The purpose of innovation is only to relieve pain? Seems rather bleak. And if we don't know that we have the problem, how are we supposed to find out besides speculating and experimenting? I'm sure Blippy thought they were improving people's lives somehow. They just guessed wrong. It happens.

SoftwareMaven 15y ago
Without knowing anything about what has really gone on a Blippy, I would question whether they asked anybody else if Blippy was improving their lives. I wouldn't say the only purpose of innovation is to relieve pain (even if I did just say it ;). Rather, humans are motivated by fairly basic things, and reducing pain and increasing pleasure are pretty much at the top (details come in defining those terms). If you can't identify what is going to motivate people to use your product, you are in trouble. When I posted the parent comment, I thought about pulling out the reference to Blippy, because they may have done everything right and just had craptastic luck.
- extension 15y ago
  I'm just trying to figure out how the "solve a problem" principle should be interpreted when evaluating an unrealized idea. It doesn't mean "solve a known problem" because people aren't aware of their problems and are notoriously bad at predicting whether they will like new things. And the "problem" doesn't have to be a bad thing that exists, it can just be something good that we are missing out on because it doesn't yet exist. And we know that many great things are created by people just to scratch their own itch. So it boils down to "make something that you think might be fun or useful to others or yourself", which seems entirely self-evident to me. I could understand "solve a problem" as a method for discovering ideas -- look for an obvious need and fill it. But many successful ideas, and I would say the most successful ideas, don't come from that process but from a more imaginative place. So, "it didn't solve a problem", whatever that means, is not sufficient to explain why an idea fails.
  - SoftwareMaven 15y ago
    First, I would leave Twitter out of the calculation, not because I don't think they solve a real need, but because I think it actually solves many for different types of people[0]. Beyond that, most companies are solving a real need: - Can't find anything worth finding on the Internet? Google. - Need a way to commoditize software for users? Microsoft. - Need to use a car on occasion in a big city? Zipcar - Have a spare room or need somewhere to crash? AirBnB Yes, you can get lucky by throwing darts and seeing what sticks, but much better to have a known problem to solve (and known by more than the founders ;). [0] Alternatively, they may just be lucky or a hype filled machine. Or, they might understand the market in an Apple-like way and are driving it. We may never know, because it could be the latter, but poor decision making at some point make it look like the former.

SoftwareMaven 15y ago

Without knowing anything about what has really gone on a Blippy, I would question whether they asked anybody else if Blippy was improving their lives. I wouldn't say the only purpose of innovation is to relieve pain (even if I did just say it ;). Rather, humans are motivated by fairly basic things, and reducing pain and increasing pleasure are pretty much at the top (details come in defining those terms). If you can't identify what is going to motivate people to use your product, you are in trouble. When I posted the parent comment, I thought about pulling out the reference to Blippy, because they may have done everything right and just had craptastic luck.

extension 15y ago
I'm just trying to figure out how the "solve a problem" principle should be interpreted when evaluating an unrealized idea. It doesn't mean "solve a known problem" because people aren't aware of their problems and are notoriously bad at predicting whether they will like new things. And the "problem" doesn't have to be a bad thing that exists, it can just be something good that we are missing out on because it doesn't yet exist. And we know that many great things are created by people just to scratch their own itch. So it boils down to "make something that you think might be fun or useful to others or yourself", which seems entirely self-evident to me. I could understand "solve a problem" as a method for discovering ideas -- look for an obvious need and fill it. But many successful ideas, and I would say the most successful ideas, don't come from that process but from a more imaginative place. So, "it didn't solve a problem", whatever that means, is not sufficient to explain why an idea fails.
- SoftwareMaven 15y ago
  First, I would leave Twitter out of the calculation, not because I don't think they solve a real need, but because I think it actually solves many for different types of people[0]. Beyond that, most companies are solving a real need: - Can't find anything worth finding on the Internet? Google. - Need a way to commoditize software for users? Microsoft. - Need to use a car on occasion in a big city? Zipcar - Have a spare room or need somewhere to crash? AirBnB Yes, you can get lucky by throwing darts and seeing what sticks, but much better to have a known problem to solve (and known by more than the founders ;). [0] Alternatively, they may just be lucky or a hype filled machine. Or, they might understand the market in an Apple-like way and are driving it. We may never know, because it could be the latter, but poor decision making at some point make it look like the former.