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I feel like there's some modern version of the Henry Ford quote, "if I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." Users say they wa

I feel like there's some modern version of the Henry Ford quote, "if I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." Users say they want all of these features in an integrated package; who would say no to a new feature? But the end result is a jumbled mess and the sacrifices made along the way weren't considered. Henry Ford said customer feedback was bad because people actually wanted a transformative product. I feel like the modern version might be that customer feedback is bad because people actually don't want a transformative product, despite surveys all saying "yes" to everything.

andrewmcwatters 2y ago
I've come to dislike this quote over the years. For the overwhelming amount of product categories, people really do just want faster, cheaper, etc. There is no moving from horse to car to flying machine, because there's no energy efficient way to do it, and no feasible path to infrastructure to support it. There is a way to make a better TV. Henry Ford never said this anyway.[1][2] 1: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37637/did-henry-ford-say-if-i-had-asked-people-what-they-wanted-they-would-have-said https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37637/did-henry... 2: https://hbr.org/2011/08/henry-ford-never-said-the-fast https://hbr.org/2011/08/henry-ford-never-said-the-fast
- syndicatedjelly 2y ago
  You're reading the worst possible interpretation of that quote, and applying it to all situations. Of course it's not valid for some mundane field - Ford delivered a whole new form of movement to the masses. It would be like if mass space-travel suddenly became available and cheap for us all. The original quote talks about transformative development, not iterative development.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
Dalewyn 2y ago
Say what you will about Steve Jobs, but he was an unparalleled salesman because he was seemingly capable of forereading what people really wanted. Nobody said they wanted an iPod or iPhone or iPad or a Macbook Air before, but when Jobs sold it to the people they went completely bonkers lining up for the goods.
- BoiledCabbage 2y ago
  Agreed, but the thing they wanted was flashy cool design more than features. Ultimately it was more about hype and being trendy is what he sold - with solid UX being number 2. There were mp3 players, tablets and phones prior to Apple. The main innovation they really provided out kf the gate out of all of those 3 was a touch screen input for the phone. The rest were just incremental improvement / polish on existing product design. Not that that isn't important (as the sales showed), but we should be clear about what was truly new to market and what was just cleaned up.
  - Lio 2y ago
    It wasn’t just a touch screen though. Ericsson had touch screen phones for many years but they where a single touch, stylus driven UI that was clunky. I had Nokia phones with web browsing, media and a camera but it was WAP not full web and the UI was so bad. Listening to media required proprietary headphones and data was extremely expensive. Jobs changed all of that in one product without adding bloatware.
- gary_0 2y ago
  > Nobody said they wanted an iPod or iPhone or iPad or a Macbook Air before What do you mean? There were MP3 players before the iPod, Blackberries and PDAs before the iPhone, and tablet computers and lightweight laptops before Apple popularized them, and people did expect the somewhat clunky early versions of these technologies to improve. For instance, there were a lot of jokes and commentary about the rapid evolution of cellphones in the 1995-2005 era as they went from horrible bricks to trendy gadgets with cameras, software, multimedia, and e-mail -- all before the iPhone had even started development. People were not totally blindsided when Apple offered their streamlined version of already-existing ideas. Jobs should get credit for the leap in quality, functionality, and mass appeal his products represented, but lately I've noticed the history is getting exaggerated to the point where we were all using rotary phones and beige boxes like cavemen before Steve Jobs singlehandedly invented the laptop, tablet, and smartphone. But the truth is far more nuanced than that.

andrewmcwatters 2y ago

I've come to dislike this quote over the years. For the overwhelming amount of product categories, people really do just want faster, cheaper, etc. There is no moving from horse to car to flying machine, because there's no energy efficient way to do it, and no feasible path to infrastructure to support it. There is a way to make a better TV. Henry Ford never said this anyway.[1][2] 1: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37637/did-henry-ford-say-if-i-had-asked-people-what-they-wanted-they-would-have-said https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/37637/did-henry... 2: https://hbr.org/2011/08/henry-ford-never-said-the-fast https://hbr.org/2011/08/henry-ford-never-said-the-fast

syndicatedjelly 2y ago
You're reading the worst possible interpretation of that quote, and applying it to all situations. Of course it's not valid for some mundane field - Ford delivered a whole new form of movement to the masses. It would be like if mass space-travel suddenly became available and cheap for us all. The original quote talks about transformative development, not iterative development.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

Dalewyn 2y ago

Say what you will about Steve Jobs, but he was an unparalleled salesman because he was seemingly capable of forereading what people really wanted. Nobody said they wanted an iPod or iPhone or iPad or a Macbook Air before, but when Jobs sold it to the people they went completely bonkers lining up for the goods.

BoiledCabbage 2y ago
Agreed, but the thing they wanted was flashy cool design more than features. Ultimately it was more about hype and being trendy is what he sold - with solid UX being number 2. There were mp3 players, tablets and phones prior to Apple. The main innovation they really provided out kf the gate out of all of those 3 was a touch screen input for the phone. The rest were just incremental improvement / polish on existing product design. Not that that isn't important (as the sales showed), but we should be clear about what was truly new to market and what was just cleaned up.
- Lio 2y ago
  It wasn’t just a touch screen though. Ericsson had touch screen phones for many years but they where a single touch, stylus driven UI that was clunky. I had Nokia phones with web browsing, media and a camera but it was WAP not full web and the UI was so bad. Listening to media required proprietary headphones and data was extremely expensive. Jobs changed all of that in one product without adding bloatware.
gary_0 2y ago
> Nobody said they wanted an iPod or iPhone or iPad or a Macbook Air before What do you mean? There were MP3 players before the iPod, Blackberries and PDAs before the iPhone, and tablet computers and lightweight laptops before Apple popularized them, and people did expect the somewhat clunky early versions of these technologies to improve. For instance, there were a lot of jokes and commentary about the rapid evolution of cellphones in the 1995-2005 era as they went from horrible bricks to trendy gadgets with cameras, software, multimedia, and e-mail -- all before the iPhone had even started development. People were not totally blindsided when Apple offered their streamlined version of already-existing ideas. Jobs should get credit for the leap in quality, functionality, and mass appeal his products represented, but lately I've noticed the history is getting exaggerated to the point where we were all using rotary phones and beige boxes like cavemen before Steve Jobs singlehandedly invented the laptop, tablet, and smartphone. But the truth is far more nuanced than that.