Why a Skype platform can lead to happiness
Here’s a 2004 TED talk by Malcolm Gladwell about the importance of variability in product design. He concludes with four points. There’s a disconnect between what people say they want when you ask them (in focus groups, for example) and what they really want and do. We all say we like dark, rich, roasted coffee but many of us like weak, creamy coffee. Horizontal segmentation can reveal that there are many variations of a product, each with their own appeal to the many variations among people. I like chunky tomato sauce, you like spicy. Until you reveal and test the clusters across a zillion dimensions, you’ll never know how you should extend your product family. While chefs have an idea that there is one right way to make a particular dish, they are wrong. The Platonic Ideal of a product misses that everyone in that restaurant has a different experience, different tastes, and that the chef’s perfection of poached halibut will only produce an "average" happiness. By searching for human variability and embracing human diversity, we’ll find a truer path to true happiness. On to Skype. Talk is a fundamental human activity and it’s tough to create access to the Skype network from everywhere people talk (or would talk if they could). So Skype gives us one Skype. It’s squeezed into different shapes to adapt to different devices and operating systems, but it’s the same Skype. This is not enough. Skype knows it. Skype is resource constrained. Everything they have is going into creating access to Skype dialtone. There is no way they can create 20 variations of Skype for Windows to serve different market segments. Let alone the thousands of variations by which people meet, engage, interact, play, learn, discover, fight, love, and experience each other. So Skype needs a multiplier. A multiplier that lets thousands of teams of developers fashion a Skype that meets their way of talking and being social. We call that platforming. Giving a solid foundation, a platform, on which others can build. Skype has several weak programming platforms now, all of them under review. The review is good. Because for as big as Skype’s market is now, it can be orders of magnitude larger. And Skype doesn’t have the time or people or money to make Skypes for all those contexts. Skype for WoW. Skype for First Responders. Skype for Shoppers. Skype for Stock Brokers. Skype for Grandparents. Skype for the Hypersocial. Skype for Twitterers. Skype for Getting Things Done. Skype for Lovers. Skype for Musicians. (I met a company that has this as a business plan) Skype for Projects. Skype for Poken. Skype for Sales. Skype for Lawyers. Skype for eBay Power Sellers. Skype for Product Managers. Skype for Hello Kitty. Skype for IMDB and other movie lovers. Skype for Manchester United. And a thousand more. Each with their own social and communication patterns, their own feature priorities, different measures of success, integration with different other systems, and support requirements. What would they have in common? An underlying brand ("Skype inside"), one login, backup, in-network connection to other Skype users, encryption, contact lists, history. And an ecosystem eager to pour a liquid Skype into the forms that make each community, each niche, each segment, each person very very happy. tags: skype, platforming, design, technology, malcolmgladwell, spaghetti, tedtalks, happinessCall me at +1-510-455-4384, Skype me, follow @skypejournal and @Phil Wolff.
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