Picking Winners

There is a debate in the policy world that has been going on for a long time: Whether or not a central entity should decide focus and investment, or if the frontiers should find their own way. There is no concensus on this issue...

We also practice both without really noticing, and work hard to play sides against the other in the name of something else. At the end of the day (and from either side) it seems to be the winners who wind up picking the Winners.

Yada

 

Get Version 1 Out

I stumbled across Paul Graham's startup essay again today and found this part resonated a little too much:

... get a version 1 out as soon as you can ... The only way to make something customers want is to get a prototype in front of them and refine it based on their reactions.

The other approach is what I call the "Hail Mary" strategy. You make elaborate plans for a product, hire a team of engineers to develop it (people who do this tend to use the term "engineer" for hackers), and then find after a year that you've spent two million dollars to develop something no one wants. This was not uncommon during the Bubble, especially in companies run by business types, who thought of software development as something terrifying that therefore had to be carefully
planned.

My world has become some odd hybrid of these two approaches. I'll say this: They don't go that well together. Gotta pick one. Or at least, crown one king.

Macrostructures

Macrostructures, Inc

Some Fruit

I've been quiet for a while, but I've been starting to see some fruit from the 2.0 fad -- and it has very little to do with Youtube.

The whole thing went overboard. More hype than it deserved, and the hype seem to spoil the promise.

But I stumbled across finetune today. I started to realize the power of consumer distribution and how consumer interaction is shaping business models. Sign up and take it for a spin. This is the first service that I think might kill online radio as we know it...

Regardless, this puppy is about interactive programming. Its beyond Launchcasts invisible hand. Its at your fingertips, and directly under your control. Playlists are active and moldable, but not required. You can listen to other people's stuff, or stuff it picks based on a single artist.

The thing that caught my attention is that it forces you to extend your network of artists or songs. Only 3 songs per artist on any playlist, and you can't play a playlist until you have about 60 songs. But there is a Lazy button. Push it and you get a rotation. finetune picks the rest for you.

THESE ARE AD PLACEMENTS. People are lazy. They will accept the engine's choices because it takes too damn long to pick 60 songs (I did at least). That's available inventory. Its almost like product placements, but you get the product itself. Skip the ad, don't need a tag line. Qualified people get your content and get exposed to your business. And the consumer gets relevent 'marketing.'

The idea extends well beyond music. That's just one form of content. Its another form of the ad game. But its a different content game that favors serial publication. You have to be refreshing your offering frequently to build the business.