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Right, I actually did read that far. I'm just trying to illustrate unless he defines it in a way the excludes cases like that, I'm not sure you can call it a la

Right, I actually did read that far. I'm just trying to illustrate unless he defines it in a way the excludes cases like that, I'm not sure you can call it a law...a generalization with exceptions, maybe. As his law is written, the cell phone example kinda disproves it. I think the problem is that paragraph you quoted can't easily be reduced to language that fits in that blue box. Just playing devil's advocate...

etal 18y ago
A worthy aim, but the whole idea of the "law" is Norvig's implied definition of what market penetration means. If 75% of the people in the world have never owned a smartphone, then doubling the number of smartphone owners is a big accomplishment, and doubling it again means you've introduced 100% of the world to smartphones. The number of phones you've sold is not the concern, it's the proportion of people whose needs have been satisfied. (At least, that's what Norvig cares about.) Without going down the route of identifying a new market, once more than 50% of the population in question has had its needs met, that market is mature -- its growth has reached a point of inflection, and no amount of pushing on the part of the existing industry will make the product continue to change lives at the rate it used to. The opportunity that was there has already been identified and seized. Now, if everyone in Finland has a personal cell phone, and another 25% also keep a separate cell phone for business use, it's suddenly worth redefining what the market is. Should the industry try to double market penetration of business-only cell phones, now? Why isn't one phone enough, and could a new product meet these separate needs better? Or alternately, some people keep two phones with different plans, and switch between them to keep the total bill down -- breaking that confusopoly is another business opportunity worth identifying, but tracking units/plans sold instead of actual market penetration by population will mask it.

etal 18y ago

A worthy aim, but the whole idea of the "law" is Norvig's implied definition of what market penetration means. If 75% of the people in the world have never owned a smartphone, then doubling the number of smartphone owners is a big accomplishment, and doubling it again means you've introduced 100% of the world to smartphones. The number of phones you've sold is not the concern, it's the proportion of people whose needs have been satisfied. (At least, that's what Norvig cares about.) Without going down the route of identifying a new market, once more than 50% of the population in question has had its needs met, that market is mature -- its growth has reached a point of inflection, and no amount of pushing on the part of the existing industry will make the product continue to change lives at the rate it used to. The opportunity that was there has already been identified and seized. Now, if everyone in Finland has a personal cell phone, and another 25% also keep a separate cell phone for business use, it's suddenly worth redefining what the market is. Should the industry try to double market penetration of business-only cell phones, now? Why isn't one phone enough, and could a new product meet these separate needs better? Or alternately, some people keep two phones with different plans, and switch between them to keep the total bill down -- breaking that confusopoly is another business opportunity worth identifying, but tracking units/plans sold instead of actual market penetration by population will mask it.