Economic cargo cults
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
In that light: yes. I think it's well put.
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R relay@relay.mycrowd.ca shared this topic
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
@masek one thing I really hate with a passion is the trend of tiny magnets in the product's packaging, only there to deliver a one-time "smooth" box opening experience. Making the package harder to recycle and adding unnecessary waste of precious magnets.
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
@masek Yep, I’ve even worked at companies that did this for themselves. They got successful, but didn’t want to admit that they had no clue, so they enshrined everything they did in their “formula”, even though a bit of critical thought could eliminate more than half of it.
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
@masek So much yes! I see this with companies forming engineering organizations. They go and emulate Google or Meta. Because they think the structure is what brought them success. They don’t realize that these companies have a scale and margins that allow them to employ certain structures that don’t fit other places. But the people emulating this then feel they are like „FANG“ companies and it’s good for linked in.
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@masek So much yes! I see this with companies forming engineering organizations. They go and emulate Google or Meta. Because they think the structure is what brought them success. They don’t realize that these companies have a scale and margins that allow them to employ certain structures that don’t fit other places. But the people emulating this then feel they are like „FANG“ companies and it’s good for linked in.
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Economic cargo cults
One thing that never ceases to fascinate me:
Small, thoroughly unremarkable companies try to emulate wildly successful ones by copying some tertiary, sometimes even actively annoying property.
Take Apple and its near-religious obsession with packaging. Their boxes are sturdy, elegant, and engineered with the kind of care normally reserved for spacecraft or Swiss watches.
So naturally, companies selling $9.99 gadgets have concluded that this is the secret sauce. Not the product. Not the ecosystem. Not the brand. No, clearly it’s the box.
What they fail to realize is that I keep an iPhone box because the device inside retains resale value. The packaging is essentially a reusable shipping container with aspirations.
The cheap gadget, on the other hand, has the resale value of an expired, half-eaten sandwich. Its box is therefore not a feature but a long-term storage problem. A nearly indestructible one. I suspect some of these packages will outlive civilization and be excavated by future archaeologists, who will conclude that we worshipped mediocre Bluetooth speakers.
Another favorite is the imitation of Google’s customer interaction model, or rather, the strategic absence of it.
Companies observe that Google doesn’t talk to its customers and infer that this must be part of the winning formula. What they miss is that Google succeeds despite this, not because of it. When you control half the internet, you can afford to be aloof. When you sell niche SaaS to 50 customers in a mildly offended corner of Germany, less so.
Yet here we are, with companies proudly offering the full “Google experience”: no support, no accountability, and a contact form that disappears into a small, silent void, presumably to be studied later by theoretical physicists.
It’s a bit like copying the table manners of a king while lacking both the kingdom and the food.
I suppose this is the corporate equivalent of a cargo cult: build the runway, light the torches, and hope that success will land.
Do you see those as well?
@masek Companies do it all the time.. the Agile that first appeared is a pale shadow of the 'Aglile' that companies breathlessly adopted with a hope of an instant boost to profits (that of course never happened).
