In a previous post I referenced the "Willie Sutton Data Principle" (WSDP). Willie Sutton (reputedly) replied, "That's where the money is" when asked, "Why do you rob banks?"
The WSDP is about data capture - the idea being data capture is most useful if it happens in the natural course of doing something - not if you have to go an extra step. Of course there are exceptions, but there are so many sites/applications where to capture the data you simply have to work too hard to make it worth your while. For me a couple of examples include untappd a terrific idea for sharing beer drinking experiences. However the work required to enter the beers far outweighs any benefit that I derive. Now I drink a lot of beer, and I try many different brews, but somehow crowdsourcing beer drinking is too much work. Similarly, I would have to be a fanatic to enter the foods/drinks that I consume into my Jawbone Up. I love the product for showing exercise and sleep habits (that's passive collection), but as soon as I have to do work to collect the data, I am simply not motivated enough.
Contrast with Google Maps - looking at "real time" traffic. That's a great WSDP app. The data are captured passively as we move around, and then made usable to other drivers. I can contribute to the crowd source - but do it without having to work at it.
Moral of the story - make your apps worth entering data - or make the data entry invisible to the user. Be a WSDP app where possible.
The WSDP is about data capture - the idea being data capture is most useful if it happens in the natural course of doing something - not if you have to go an extra step. Of course there are exceptions, but there are so many sites/applications where to capture the data you simply have to work too hard to make it worth your while. For me a couple of examples include untappd a terrific idea for sharing beer drinking experiences. However the work required to enter the beers far outweighs any benefit that I derive. Now I drink a lot of beer, and I try many different brews, but somehow crowdsourcing beer drinking is too much work. Similarly, I would have to be a fanatic to enter the foods/drinks that I consume into my Jawbone Up. I love the product for showing exercise and sleep habits (that's passive collection), but as soon as I have to do work to collect the data, I am simply not motivated enough.
Contrast with Google Maps - looking at "real time" traffic. That's a great WSDP app. The data are captured passively as we move around, and then made usable to other drivers. I can contribute to the crowd source - but do it without having to work at it.
Moral of the story - make your apps worth entering data - or make the data entry invisible to the user. Be a WSDP app where possible.
No comments:
Post a Comment