flipflop2234
New member
I wanted to push back on the sentiment I’ve heard expressed by YC folk. I’m not necessarily married to this opinion and am just thinking out loud, and would be curious as to what everyone thinks. Michael Seibel explained once in a video that when it comes to MVPs, you should 'launch quickly and iterate. Get a product into the hands of our customers and then learn whether it helps them or doesn't, and then iterate it and improve it over time.' The sentiment is echoed in the YC ecosystem, especially when responding to concerns about launching a less-than-clean MVP. When I say 'less-than-clean,' I don’t necessarily mean unusable or lacking MVP-esque features. I mean one that perhaps has a few small bugs, or perhaps isn’t very visually pleasing, or even just plain hideous. I understand that the core philosophy behind launching an MVP is to validate a business idea with the minimum amount of effort and resources—in essence, an MVP is supposed to provide data, and the data is supposed to inform the decision on whether or not to iterate.
Here is where I am pushing back. The assumption is that a customer will want your product so badly that they will concede a less-than-clean MVP. However, personally, I would not use one of these no matter how bad my need for something was (unless I’m literally on the verge of dying, and if you’re solving THAT problem, props to you). The logic kind of goes, 'If your customer is on fire, give them water (or whatever),' and their need will outweigh their reservations or biases. But my whole thing is, if that water is irremediably putrid, some people won’t use it including me. To me, that’s where the logic breaks because we are supposed to use our MVP data to iterate—I feel as though a less-than-clean MVP will create skewed insights. In my case, I could very well want the product, even need it, but could be just turned off by the MVP. In this case, the founders should not iterate the whole idea; they should clean up their MVP. Maybe the idea could use some iteration, but wouldn't it make sense to capture the low hanging fruit first—certainly feels like it'd be cheaper and less time-consuming than iterating? I could be wrong, but I feel as though I can’t be the only one who is pretty unforgiving of less-than-clean MVPs. Here is what I want to know: Would you use (my definition of) a 'less-than-clean' MVP? Would you use an even lesser-than-clean MVP wrought with bugs if you really needed the product? What is the minimal threshold for how aesthetically pleasing an MVP should be? Again, not married to the opinion, just thinking out loud—no need to totally destroy me lol
Here is where I am pushing back. The assumption is that a customer will want your product so badly that they will concede a less-than-clean MVP. However, personally, I would not use one of these no matter how bad my need for something was (unless I’m literally on the verge of dying, and if you’re solving THAT problem, props to you). The logic kind of goes, 'If your customer is on fire, give them water (or whatever),' and their need will outweigh their reservations or biases. But my whole thing is, if that water is irremediably putrid, some people won’t use it including me. To me, that’s where the logic breaks because we are supposed to use our MVP data to iterate—I feel as though a less-than-clean MVP will create skewed insights. In my case, I could very well want the product, even need it, but could be just turned off by the MVP. In this case, the founders should not iterate the whole idea; they should clean up their MVP. Maybe the idea could use some iteration, but wouldn't it make sense to capture the low hanging fruit first—certainly feels like it'd be cheaper and less time-consuming than iterating? I could be wrong, but I feel as though I can’t be the only one who is pretty unforgiving of less-than-clean MVPs. Here is what I want to know: Would you use (my definition of) a 'less-than-clean' MVP? Would you use an even lesser-than-clean MVP wrought with bugs if you really needed the product? What is the minimal threshold for how aesthetically pleasing an MVP should be? Again, not married to the opinion, just thinking out loud—no need to totally destroy me lol