Don’t believe the hype
Flock beta testers discover it won’t cure cancer or bring them gifts on Christmas morning*
Can you hear the whining? No, not my kids “asking” for chocolate milk, I mean the loud sigh of “is that all there is?” I can hear all the way from the Valley.
It seems that a whole lot of people have a bad case of buyers remorse over Flock. The hubbub even moved Flockster Chris Messina to provide a spirited reason d’être for Flock’s existence.
But the bigger question is … is Flock a victim of its own hype? Michael Arrington thinks so. He had this to say, responding to Chris:
My guess is Flock is suffering from a bit of backlash over its early hype. And my further guess is that Flock, backed by an impressive group of founders and investors, has a few massive tricks up its sleeve that will be announced (or leak out) sometime soon.
The whole release early, release often mentality is good in theory. When practiced against an impatient audience, it can quickly squash whatever goodwill and coolness factor a start-up can generate. And the process will only feed itself as more start-ups do alpha releases (if alpha is the new beta, what’s the new alpha) and invite-onlyl pre-alpha pre-releases in response to a blogosphere hungry for the Next Cool Thing(tm).
So what’s the solution? Managing expectations can only take you so far. So release early and put on your flack jacket.
And regarding all the fuss over Performancing’s Firefox plug-in, I can already blog from Firefox. I’m doing it right now. Through WordPress’s interface. Funny isn’t it?
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*I nicked this image from Sadly, No!. They are a very cool site… go visit them.
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Comments
It’s a risk companies take - look at Riya right now, and how beloved it is. I was part of Alpha I, uninstalled the 1 GB uploader, and haven’t bothered to try out Alpha II … all because Chuck D and Flavor Flav said ‘don’t believe the hype’ … and because I didn’t see the value as a consumer.
Is Riya the next one to get Flocked? Probably, and I’m not sure their team is in a position to handle such negative attacks.
Best advice I’ve heard in awhile: “So release early and put on your flack jacket.”
Thank you, David, for raising that important aspect of this discussion.
Performancing is a nice add-in, Flock’s not bad either. For a *much* more advanced blog editor, check out RocketPost:
http://www.anconia.com/rocketpost
It supports built-in photo editing, auto links to related posts, Technorati/Delicious tags, AutoCorrect, and lots more. (I designed it.)
(reposted from chrism’s blog comments)
It would also help not to throw lots of big parties to hype your product (or even your ideas) until they’re good enough to live up to that hype.
It’s not as if all the buzz was a big accident. I mean, I was there at OSCON when [Flock folks] came on the scene to get some buzz from the press and people attending there. I saw the guestlist and photos [they] posted for the San Francisco party. A few months ago [the Flock team] were not only working to generate that buzz, [they] were eating it up (look back at those photos). Now it seems that [they're] blaming outside forces for drumming up that buzz.
I don’t believe this has anything to do with releasing code early and often. I’d wager that [Flock's] problem with expectations is a result of releasing a very loud buzz machine early and often.
– A
[...] Brian, and others, are riffing on the idea that Flock is overhyped. I tend to agree. Build something and let people start using - no need for a long drawn out PR blitz prior to the launch (note to self). I am not sure I agree with David Parmet’s views on beta, alpha and prealpha (hehe), but there is something here. Brian asks, "Who is doing the right kind of marketing given the new environment?" I would love to know the answer. Here are some of my ideas: [...]
I don’t see what the problem is. It is a developer preview, not the finished product. It was released earlier than most others to allow more of the general public to be a part of the development. Who was expecting the holy grail, here? And as for the “hype” how else did people expect to get the word out? Hype is what we respond to. Sad but true.
Maresh:
I downloaded Rocket Post basic and it’s so complicated that I have not been able to use it. The configuration process requires a PHD in rocket science. If you want people to use your product, you have to make it useful and easy to use. So easy to use like an iPod and iTunes.
Regarding Flock’s hype, I really don’t see an issue there. Since they released their DP version (not a finished product), they have continually upgraded it to wipe out reported bugs. I’m writing the comment with Flock 0.5.12 and it works so well, I sometimes forget it is a DP version.
The addition of Spellbound checking speller made it better, as well as using another social bookmarks dubbed Shadows. Just let Flock’s Devs some time and space and they will deliver a useful and “different” social tool; not necessarily a traditional web browser.
Cheers,
Omar.-
Perpetual Beta + Old School Hype Cycles = Hurt Feelings
David Parmet riffs a bit on the Flock post mentioned below (and evokes my fav cockeyed 90’s sidekick Flava Flav): The whole release early, release often mentality is good in theory. When practiced against an impatient audience, it can…