I thought all the emphasis of how great it was made it harder for people to understand _what_ "it" was. Probably a good idea to keep an initial post like this matter-of-fact. Motivate it with just one simple strength that's easiest to communicate. Describe the broader context and implications in a separate post, later, after people understand what it is.
I totally agree. Although perhaps I wouldn't have gotten as much feedback had I taken a more modest approach? Hard to say. I still haven't done a good job communicating the benefits of ETNs yet, stemming from their 2D/geometric nature. Almost got version 1.1 of Ohayo done which makes another step toward that.
That motivation makes sense. Bear in mind, though, that the "less modest" approach has a limited amount of gas. It will stop working at some point.
I can relate with having these questions and considering the different strategies as well. If you really think that this is going to be your life's work, it's reasonable to burn some 'reputation' to get the word out. However, I've often been wrong before. Now I tend to err on the side of playing a long game.
Over time I've gained respect for the essential wisdom of this quote:
"We knew that Google was going to get better every single day as we worked on it, and we knew that sooner or later everyone was going to try it. So our feeling was that the later you tried it, the better it was for us because we’d make a better impression with better technology. So we were never in a big hurry to get you to use it today. Tomorrow would be better." -- Sergey Brin, as retold by Seth Godin in "The Dip"
Applicable to ideas like here just as much as products.
Wow, what a quote! That's exactly how I feel about Ohayo. That seems like a better approach--not to be in a big hurry to get people to use it today. Thank you akkartik. Really appreciate that advice!
My only concern pre-launch and announcement, was that I was going to get hit by a bus and the world would have to wait longer for someone else to stumble upon (and popularize) TN and ETNs. Now that it's out there and a few thousand people have seen it, I can take this more sensible approach.
Fantastic advice.
Btw, just pushed version 1.1.0 if anyone's interested.
UX still needs work, but I rushed adding a "3D block" to the flow language, (using the vis.js library), so you can start to see what "3D" code looks like.
