Simplicity Rules

A couple years ago I found a really cool formula for determining how much an idea is worth. It proposed that ideas were just a multiplier for execution, which is where the real money is.

Seems right to me, but then I’ve also always suspected there was something else going on.

I think Elliot is on to something about finding a proper balance:

“Let your idea inspire you to start executing, then let your execution continue to inspire your ideas.”

It’s not as simple as hard work. It takes idea refinement, some of which can only come from executing on the idea.

I ran across this pretty great quote about simplicity:

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex and more violent. It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.”

It’s a powerful truism, something to which any of us who believe in simplicity can relate.

It was attributed to a famous German physicist. Immediately, I wanted to share it, but something made me question the attribution.

When I discovered it might have instead been a quote from a less famous (but still German) economist, E.F. Schumacher, I was less interested in sharing it.

The words are no less powerful. Or are they?

The physicist was, of course, Albert Einstein. His name has become a shortcut to communicate importance. So, even if it was Schmacher’s words, Einstein seems to have played an integral role in making their meaning.

Via Etre

Are you lazy? You’d probably say no. You go to the gym, ride your bike, and sometimes get outdoors for a long walk. But when it comes to using the Web, we’re all lazy.

So, I can’t see why companies insist on treating us any other way. In a moment of weakness, I clicked “Live Help” on the US Airways website. That’s something I’ve been trained not to do, because the Web really doesn’t have real-time down yet. But I clicked it this time, and I was unsurprisingly disappointed.

Catch that? Close this window… Click the ‘Live Help!’ link again. I know they can’t have an agent at my beck and call, but the least they could do is retry for me automatically.

I followed their directions. I closed the window and clicked again. I did that exactly once. When I got the same window, the one that doesn’t acknowledge that I’m lazy, I gave up.

Bad service is as expected from an airline as it is from a credit card company. For that reason, I was surprised when Capital One gave me a lazy option the last time I logged in.

First, a little back story. I have two Capital One cards. They each have separate logins, which makes it sort of a pain. But dangit, I’m just happy to have access to them online, where I can avoid long hold times and pitches for payment protection. So, imagine my delight when I saw this:

The process took a couple of clicks. They did almost everything for me, and now I have access to both accounts from one place. How’s that for simple? And lazy.

A pretty basic assumption of this site is that keeping things simple is better for you and better for your customers or users. As part of that assumption, I think companies that focus on simplicity will be most successful (though they need to do it well).

Bob Sullivan says complexity is profitable:

“Most people just kind of surrender in the face of all this confusion. And a confused consumer is a profitable consumer. It’s much easier to make people pay extra and lose a whole lot of money when they’ve given up keeping track of what their real costs are.

There’s a great interview with Sullivan on NPR’s Fresh Air. He talks about hidden fees, unethical term changes, and email scams.

Complexity, like a magician’s banter, is a distraction for big company sleight of hand.

Via Josh.

Simplexity is a term being used to describe the relationship between simplicity and complexity. Without that label, it’s something I’ve thought about for some time.

A simple interface can hide a complex system. Think of how little I know about how my car works, yet I’m able to drive it without problems. Anything that cuts through the clutter is a simplexity solution. A popular Web example: a search engine ranking the best resources for your input, choosing from millions of pages.

The Laws of Simplicity say that simplicity and complexity need each other. Without complexity, there can be no simple solution. Or, rather, there would be no complex solution to make better.

For more “head in the clouds” thoughts on this topic, see how simplicity and complexity are alike.

Via Duffy

The problem: getting wind power to third world countries. Standard wind turbines are too expensive, especially since they need to be massive and near heavy winds to work efficiently.

“In a conventional wind generator, gears help transfer the motion of the spinning blades to a turbine where an electric current is induced. The Windbelt is simpler and more efficient in light breezes—a magnet mounted on a vibrating membrane simply oscillates between wire coils.” — Popular Mechanics

In the video below, see 28 year-old inventor of the Windbelt talk about his cheap, simple, and innovative device.

via Josh

The title–in fact, all–of this post comes from the book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, a book about knowing what you don’t know.

“I noticed that very intelligent and informed person were at no advantage over cabdrivers in their predictions, but there was a crucial difference. Cabdrivers did no believe that they understood as much as learned people–really, they were not the experts and they knew it. Nobody knew anything, but elite thinkers thought that they knew more than the rest because they were elite thinkers, and if you’re a member of the elite, you automatically know more than the nonelite.”

Knowing nothing can be good. And yes, knowing too much can be bad.

Just try not to think like a technician (or a member of the elite).

Portlanders continue to do some amazing things. Unfortunately, a lot of it is still under the covers. My friend Rick is helping change that, but we have a long way to go. One of ways to help is get out and meet people. Far too many of us spend our lives in front of laptop flicker.

Consider this my annual call to join the Portland Web/Tech community by sharing my Portland groups.
Just about any event these days gets listed on Upcoming. You can see my list of Web/Tech events.

This year there is a new non-profit, Legion of Tech (I am on the board) that will help put on some popular Portland tech events:

• Ignite Portland, Feb. 5. I spoke at the first Ignite. And you can speak at this one (Jan. 15 deadline for submissions).
• Startupalooza, Mar. 29, will focus more on the biz side of things with the promise of a “no-BS environment.”
• The ad-hoc un-conference BarCamp Portland returns in May. The schedule and topics are decided the first day by the attendees.

There are also many regular gatherings. If you have a specific technology you love, there’s probably a user group for you. If you’re a generalist, there’s still a group for you:

• Portland Web Innovators is a group I helped start that tries to cover fun, new topics at the convergence of web and business.
• BarCamp Meetups are informal get-togethers where you can grab a beer, eat some pretzels, and just chat. As BarCamp nears, they may also become more about planning the event.

In many situations, I think making something simple is knowing when to make a special case. And I’d further guess that usually you don’t want to make one. Here’s an example where someone did not make a special case.

Eric Sink lives in the same city as University of Illinois. He ordered a Rose Bowl ticket, and here’s what he said happened:

“I laughed out loud. UPS Overnight? I live right here in Champaign-Urbana. The University of Illinois Athletic Ticket Office is less than two miles from my office. Surely I could just go over during my lunch hour and pick them up?

“No, I suppose not. These folks are trying to process orders for over 25,000 tickets and they have very little time to do it. They probably just want to have one standard method of handling them all. Dealing with the special cases would slow everything down.”

He goes on to show another example of when a special case was the better choice.

“Sure enough — my tickets were being sent 1.8 miles by ‘Next Day Air.’ At this point, I fully expected that this envelope would be traveling across town by way of O’Hare.

“Much to my surprise, UPS actually figured out that it was already in its destination city”

I’m not sure it is always so obvious when to make the special case. There is unlikely to be any formula to help you decide. One of the troubles is that a special case involves a trade-off of whether you’re making things easier on you, or easier on your user. The art is deciding when each is the best choice.