Utility Ambiguity

I get excited when I see new tools and I have no idea how to use them. Despite my lack of understanding of the utility, I get this deep, gut sense that they are somehow useful. Is it hype? Maybe. But it’s easy to dismiss it as that. I think we’re going to see more and more powerful new tools, devices, sites and ways to interact that don’t have a clear value proposition. They can’t say “this is important because it lets you do this.”

It’s why Twitter is so different from Facebook. The value proposition of Facebook is clear: stay in contact with friends and share with them. But what do you use Twitter for? No one knows, because there’s no right way to use it. It’s why it fascinates some, and beguiles others. Twitter can’t even craft a clear value proposition on their homepage to say what the site is for. If you are someone who needs convincing, that’s frustrating, because everyone is talking about Twitter. If you are observant, it’s a sign that something big is happening. It’s not a hammer with one specific use. It’s not even a swiss army knife that can do many different things. It’s more akin to two pieces of stone, from which you can make your own tool: arrowhead or hand axe.

And what of the iPad? What do you do with it? “Isn’t it just a big iPhone? It doesn’t have Flash!” I don’t care. I look at it and all I see is potential. Essentially, a big, touch-sensitive blank slate. What’s it for? It’s hard to give a keynote on something that’s value is based on the fact that it’s a device that can go almost anywhere and do almost anything. How do you sell something that can be a medical device for doctors but also a gaming platform for bored tweens? A kiosk display unit for a sales person or an educational device for a fifth grader?

What do we use this stuff for? It’s hard to get excited about new platforms because their value is ambiguous. Twitter is about making the zeitgeist accessible through a platform. It captures and makes accessible the defining spirit or mood of not just an era, but of today, February 1, 2010. (Apparently, this is a sullen Monday morning, because lots of users are wanting to contemplate the “worst feeling ever.”)

What’s the iPad for? Well, right now I reckon it’s for media consumption, games, and simple computing (note, not basic computing). But the value of it won’t be determined until third parties grab a hold of it and harness its potential to make a clearer value proposition to users.

You can sense the issue with how Apple sells the iPhone. Yes, it’s a phone, but it does all this other stuff I wouldn’t be able to imagine on my own. Apple’s commercials for the iPhone literally have to tell us how to use it so we can contain it’s amorphous utility into bite-sized selling points. Of course, there will be a similar campaign for the iPad.

Regardless, it feels like an important shift when the two cultural markers of early 2010 aren’t products, but platforms. Clear-cut utility won’t ever completely go away, but I think that more and more, I’ll place value on products and sites and ideas by how excited I am to participate with and contribute to them. Attention and enthusiasm are scarcer resources than money.

Initially, it’s hard for a consumer’s mind to understand the value of a platform. But, it’s easy for a maker to perceive that value. In fact, the platform’s worth depends on it. It some how seems right that the early value of a platform is completely dependent on the imagination.

So, here we are. We’ve two rocks. Make your own tool. It’s what made us human to begin with.