Saturday, August 02, 2003

Source: Elizabeth Grigg - Developer / PM Post: I Want Something New. I want new blog software. Now, there's nothing wrong with the crop of blog software out there, but it all pretty much works the same. I'm not even sure what I want different... I just want something different. What I want, really, is something so radically different that it's hard to even call it "blog software". [The .NET Guy] This is a great type of question. This is a CEO question. It says more than calling attention to the fact that there's a market for something that doesn't exist. It says that fulfilling this need is secondary to defining it. Define it right and you win, that's your edge. It also says that technology has not done a good job of capturing and reinterpreting for us. Technology is not a good reporter, unbiased, efficient, and organized. Most blogs I read including mine offer a tiny sliver of that person's universe. Here Brad is asking what would we do with the 99% of our brain that we're not using. Replace brain with blog (=spare brain) and you've got the idea. I read somewhere that the impulse to suicide in humans is really a desire for instantaneous, transformative change. A new outfit and a square meal won't really do the trick. Of couse sometimes therapy and a new city will, but my point is that a technology like blogging has to find a way to change deeply just like a person does. Okay steps for doing this. I would start with analysis. What is working with blogging today, and what surprisingly does not. What are the soft benefits, the indicators that we know a blog is good, either writing or reading. What is the context of blogging compared to other communications, where does the overlap occur and when is blogging unique. The analysis will get quite confusing and multifaceted. This is good. As the person analyzing you can then step back and think what if I was analyzing something less complicated? Something simple? And after this work, the simple thing will occur to you, the thing with all the good parts and evolved one step farther besides. If not, back to more analysis. I suppose my technique is a combination of brute force whiteboard alternating with zenlike awareness. Whatever works. Hey, could that be a band, bruteforce whiteboard? [Elizabeth Grigg - Developer / PM] 10:34:45 AM    trackback []     Articulate []