Read Write Web takes random shots at Profilactic
I met Marshall Kirkpatrick at SXSWi this year. He was a very cool, approachable guy. We had a nice chat during the Frog Design party. And I generally like the stuff he writes.
However, today, he wrote something that just doesn't make a lot of sense. Of course, the fact that it is about Profilactic will make my comments seem like sour grapes; however, I trust anyone reading this can be objective and evaluate the comments from both of us.
Marshall decides to do a "this" vs. "that" post where he discusses services that take two different approaches to the same problem.
He starts off with aggregation and puts FriendFeed head-to-head with Profilactic under a section labeled "Long Tail vs. User Experience." His premise is that FriendFeed has chosen to focus on the user experience by supporting fewer sites than we do and that we're ignoring the user experience by going after the long tail and supporting more.
The problem is that he never connects the dots as to why focusing on fewer sites makes FF a better experience. Nor does he explore why supporting more sites makes the user experience worse.
His argument is that no one really uses services like Muxtape or Toluu, so why support them?
From a resource or efficiency perspective, that would be a valid argument. Why support 177 when most users use the same list of 10-15 sites? I get that.
However, he is arguing that supporting these sites somehow hurts the user experience. If people really don't use those sites, what is the harm in having them in the list? Sure, you have to look past them when you choose your sites, but is it really that big of a deal?
Here's what he said about it:
"What's not to love about Profilactic's support for super-awesome services like music mix sharing service Muxtape and the RSS community Toluu? That's awesome. Except not very many people use those services. In the mean time, I don't want to use Profilactic and neither do most of my friends. I could use it without them but that's not as much fun as using FriendFeed.
It seems to me that Profilactic has sacrificed user experience for long tail support. That's a sacrifice that probably won't serve them well. None the less, we wish them the best."
Of course, in the middle of not really making his point about user experience versus the long tail, Marshall adds the random shot of "In the mean time, I don't want to use Profilactic and neither do most of my friends. I could use it without them but that's not as much fun as using FriendFeed."
OK, so why doesn't he use Profilactic? The name? The user experience? He doesn't say. To me, that's just poorly reasoned and written.
Don't get me wrong, if you want to criticize us, knock yourself out. We can take it. However, back your statements up.
I generally don't like to call people out; however, bloggers with an audience and influence the size of Marshall's should try a little harder than that.
The way it is written now comes off like a Journalism 101 compare-and-contrast assignment gone awry.
And, again, feel free to chalk my comments up to sour grapes...
However, today, he wrote something that just doesn't make a lot of sense. Of course, the fact that it is about Profilactic will make my comments seem like sour grapes; however, I trust anyone reading this can be objective and evaluate the comments from both of us.
Marshall decides to do a "this" vs. "that" post where he discusses services that take two different approaches to the same problem.
He starts off with aggregation and puts FriendFeed head-to-head with Profilactic under a section labeled "Long Tail vs. User Experience." His premise is that FriendFeed has chosen to focus on the user experience by supporting fewer sites than we do and that we're ignoring the user experience by going after the long tail and supporting more.
The problem is that he never connects the dots as to why focusing on fewer sites makes FF a better experience. Nor does he explore why supporting more sites makes the user experience worse.
His argument is that no one really uses services like Muxtape or Toluu, so why support them?
From a resource or efficiency perspective, that would be a valid argument. Why support 177 when most users use the same list of 10-15 sites? I get that.
However, he is arguing that supporting these sites somehow hurts the user experience. If people really don't use those sites, what is the harm in having them in the list? Sure, you have to look past them when you choose your sites, but is it really that big of a deal?
Here's what he said about it:
"What's not to love about Profilactic's support for super-awesome services like music mix sharing service Muxtape and the RSS community Toluu? That's awesome. Except not very many people use those services. In the mean time, I don't want to use Profilactic and neither do most of my friends. I could use it without them but that's not as much fun as using FriendFeed.
It seems to me that Profilactic has sacrificed user experience for long tail support. That's a sacrifice that probably won't serve them well. None the less, we wish them the best."
Of course, in the middle of not really making his point about user experience versus the long tail, Marshall adds the random shot of "In the mean time, I don't want to use Profilactic and neither do most of my friends. I could use it without them but that's not as much fun as using FriendFeed."
OK, so why doesn't he use Profilactic? The name? The user experience? He doesn't say. To me, that's just poorly reasoned and written.
Don't get me wrong, if you want to criticize us, knock yourself out. We can take it. However, back your statements up.
I generally don't like to call people out; however, bloggers with an audience and influence the size of Marshall's should try a little harder than that.
The way it is written now comes off like a Journalism 101 compare-and-contrast assignment gone awry.
And, again, feel free to chalk my comments up to sour grapes...
profilactic
lifestreaming
aggregator
Comments:
Sorry to have been offline all day since writing that post. I even tried to comment by mobile and it didn't work. :(
So my argument was intended to be just what you said above, actually: that y'all appear to have chosen to focus on extending your supported services instead of focusing your resources on site usability. I'd like to see your account discovery more like Lijit's and some friend recommendation like FriendFeed's (or better) for example. In my admittedly limited testing of Profilactic I didn't find the way it presented information and options nearly as frictionless as FF, the 3rd party Twitter clients on AIR or some other services that really nail usability. I think that's part of why I find my community more on FF than here.
Re long tail services, I love that you support all the services that you do. I just think that strategic decision has ended up costing you (so far) the usability that leads to users which lead to further network effects.
These are early days in the lifestreaming market though and I'd love to see you guys end up stealing the presumed crown from a crew of ex-google golden boys :) I just really like what they've done with the service so far.
Good luck!
So my argument was intended to be just what you said above, actually: that y'all appear to have chosen to focus on extending your supported services instead of focusing your resources on site usability. I'd like to see your account discovery more like Lijit's and some friend recommendation like FriendFeed's (or better) for example. In my admittedly limited testing of Profilactic I didn't find the way it presented information and options nearly as frictionless as FF, the 3rd party Twitter clients on AIR or some other services that really nail usability. I think that's part of why I find my community more on FF than here.
Re long tail services, I love that you support all the services that you do. I just think that strategic decision has ended up costing you (so far) the usability that leads to users which lead to further network effects.
These are early days in the lifestreaming market though and I'd love to see you guys end up stealing the presumed crown from a crew of ex-google golden boys :) I just really like what they've done with the service so far.
Good luck!
Marshall,
Thanks for taking the time to respond with specific details. Those are things that we can definitely look at and make improvements where needed.
As you said, we're all still figuring this out. I fully expect lifestreaming to be a completely different (and better) market this time next year.
Again, I appreciate you taking the time to respond.
sm
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Thanks for taking the time to respond with specific details. Those are things that we can definitely look at and make improvements where needed.
As you said, we're all still figuring this out. I fully expect lifestreaming to be a completely different (and better) market this time next year.
Again, I appreciate you taking the time to respond.
sm
