I’m writing this post in iA Writer, a decidedly low-tech text editor with less than 10 features. I’m running the vast majority of my software in my browser. Pretty much every software product I use has significantly less features than their earlier competitors. If I were to ride a bicycle it would be a fixie — not a fancy 26-gear mountain bike with dual-shock absorbers.
I believe we’ve reached the feature peak when it comes to the products which surround us. As the world around is getting more complex by the day we crave simpler tools. Better designed tools. Tools which do one thing and do this one thing exceptionally well. Gone are the days of do-it-all software suites, feature-bloated tools which smother the creative process in rows and rows of toolbars.
This is an enormous opportunity for entrepreneurs. There is a huge market for the taking — take any product category, look at the existing tools, identify what the 5–10% of features are people really use and like, then build an exceptionally well designed product around those features. And resist the urge to add features.
I, for one, will buy your product.