Many, especially in business, would argue the opposite; the first mover advantage is huge. Case in point, the business strategy of Sony.
The philosophy of "lifers"--build a widget, establish a broad base of loyal, satisfied customers, grow the organization organically is about as obsolete as "Live long and prosper." Ask any small business owner in a location adjacent to Wal-Mart about customer loyalty and branding. Or ask anyone who worked in the Oldsmobile division of GM. > Date: Fri, 19 Oct 2007 09:30:49 -0700> To: gflato at nanometrics.com; > tekwrytr at hotmail.com; framers at lists.frameusers.com> From: john at > hedtke.com> Subject: First on market (was RE: radical revamping of techpubs)> > > Despite the incredible pressure that people feel to be the first on > the > market with the latest release, I think history shows that it is > almost > NEVER the first product to market that has long-term success, > at least in > high-tech. The IBM PC was not the first to market by a > number of years. > Microsoft hasn't ever gotten there first with > anything that comes to mind. > VisiCalc. WordStar. Doc-to-Help was, > I think, on the market before > Robohelp, yet they got outmarketed > ultimately. VHS vs. Beta: Beta was, and > is, a better overall format > but VHS outmarketed Beta and >poof< no more > Beta. And so on. It > could be argued that what tends to work is the products > that watched > what the first product did and then didn't make the same > mistakes or > at least capitalized on marketing. There are exceptions to > > this--Visio comes to mind--where something is so truly innovative as > to be > unique, but these are rare and stellar examples. For the most > part, the > first product to cross the finish line is guaranteed to > ~not~ survive the > test of time.> > Even on a short-term basis, pushing a product out the door > to meet an > arbitrary schedule gets you what you deserve. Who here is fool > > enough to install the .0 version of anything from, say, Microsoft or > Adobe? > And who, having done that, got away with it with their > computing skin > intact? Robert Cringely was nice enough to quote me > in his column a couple > months ago: "At Microsoft, quality is job > SP1," but this is an aphorism you > could apply to a lot of companies, > not just the folks in Redmond. They all > feel the same pressures and > make the same mistakes.> > If I knew that a > company was actively taking a few extra months to > plan things and deliver > me a bug-free product, I'd be very impressed > and would consider that > heavily when shopping for something.> > > Yours truly,> > John Hedtke> > Author/Consultant/Contract Writer> www.hedtke.com <-- website> 541-685-5000 > (office landline)> 541-554-2189 (cell)> john at hedtke.com (primary email)> > johnhedtke at aol.com (secondary email) > _________________________________________________________________ Windows Live Hotmail and Microsoft Office Outlook ? together at last. ?Get it now. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/HA102225181033.aspx?pid=CL100626971033
