Thoughts/Essay

Letting Go

Fri, May 17, 2013 - 12:31am -- Isaac Sukin

I recently read something by Aza Raskin that resonated with me. He suggested that delegation -- letting others have ownership over your baby -- is an essential part of leadership that is often inhibited by an attachment to the product, and this attachment comes from the fact that the product's success or failure is a reflection of your own success or failure as the product's leader.

High-End Pricing: Differentiate or Die (Not X for Y)

Sat, Sep 29, 2012 - 6:26pm -- Isaac Sukin

Pricing is a funny thing. It depends a lot on psychology -- how can you convince your customers that they are getting a deal while charging them the highest reasonable value? You've heard people say "differentiate" before, but I bet you haven't really thought deeply about whether you're really different. Here's a test: are you an alternative, or are you your own category? If you didn't exist, what would people use instead, and how would they feel about it? Are you a category leader or are you a small player that tries to be better than the leader?

Startups: Don't Build (just) a Social Network

Sat, Sep 22, 2012 - 3:00pm -- Isaac Sukin

As the guy who wrote one of the first open-source status update systems in 2007, the main developer behind Acquia Commons social business software 2.x, and an evangelist of social communications technologies, writing the title of this post feels strange. I've spent the last 5 years of my life building software to make it easy for people to build social networks, so why would I suggest that sometimes you shouldn't do it?

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