Starting Over | Hacker News Reader

Starting Over

inc.com

This article says absolutely nothing. OK, there's a new Basecamp coming. Some people are going to complain when they see it, some people are going to love it. Can we see some details? Maybe a screen shot.

A green field "version 2" isn't exactly breaking new ground either.

Serious question. Is there a "next page" link on this article that I'm just not seeing?

totally agree. usually Jason writes great stuff. this is just an ad.

This is his column for Inc, not an unveiling of the product. Look at the title, he's talking about redoing a product from the ground up, and using his experience as a parable for businesses everywhere to ponder. It's not called "Introducing Basecamp 2.0"

Rewriting software to start fresh always SOUNDS like a great plan, especially to engineers, but this usually ends up bad for the end user and takes 5 times as long as planned (Netscape anyone?).

Basecamp could definitely use a refresh, but as a daily user I do worry something will be lost if it's completely redone.

1. Rewrites are a bad idea if you're rewriting what already exists today. We're writing something new. It's not a rewrite of today's Basecamp.

2. Nothing changes with the Basecamp you already know and love. The new Basecamp is an entirely different product. You can use whichever you prefer, no one is being forced to change or switch.

> The new Basecamp is an entirely different product.

Good on you. This is how it should be done.

Thanks for the reply Jason, a new and interesting twist from 37signals as usual :). This seems awkward from a branding point of view, like new users can sign up for Basecamp or New Basecamp? Or old users can use old Basecamp but new users can't signup, or it really is completely different and maybe I'll be using old Basecamp and new Basecamp?

So is your new product going to do the same thing as old Basecamp? Are you targeting the same audience? Don't you think that's cannibalizing your own user base and helping your competitors?

Unless you're building the whole new product that serves a different purpose, and is only influenced by Basecamp - in that case, it makes sense.

This is very Apple. If somebody is going to cannibalize our market anyway, we prefer to do it ourselves.

If they've identified a new approach to project collaboration that is superior to their existing product, it makes sense to develop it. If they don't, someone else will, and their prize will be a portion of 37signal's market share.

Basecamp has been awesome for a wide range of users, but we're seeing other folks taking a stab at this space (e.g. https://trello.com/) and eventually someone is going to come up with something that is all around better for the average user. Why wait for the inevitable?

It does some of the things the existing Basecamp does.

It doesn't do some of the things the existing Basecamp does.

It does new things the existing Basecamp doesn't do.

It's a new product with new ideas about what's important in a product like Basecamp. It's not the same as today's Basecamp, but it's still familiar to the millions who've used Basecamp.

Are you kidding? They're going to get years of posts and articles about how they dealt with "Second System Effect." This rewrite will be a boon to their business side, even if people are complaining on the utility side.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-system_effect

It will be interesting to see how they go about this. Even ignoring the whole thing about user inertia, I have only heard horror stories on how completely re-writing an app from scratch has caused all kinds of unforeseen problems.

This: Second System Effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month#The_seco...

And this: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html

I imagine we'll hear about it. It's nice to get an inside look at the challenges of another company.

Eventually, it will be interesting to see what functionality people have gotten used to in the current version of Basecamp that doesn't make it over to the next version and how those changes get implemented.

People don't always use tools the way they were intended to be used. Because of that, there are non-obvious features/functionality that may not have even been on the drawing board for the next version. Will 37signals go back and re-implement those subtle pieces or will they put a stake in the ground and say "this is the new way forward".

It could end up becoming an interesting study on how to bridge the gap with two systems when the next version is a complete rewrite.

The easy thing to do is nothing. But continuing on the current path is a time-tested formula for complacency.

I wish I heard that from the new RIM CEO.

It'll be bigger, slower, buggier and more expensive (all rewrites are). A hard sell.

This is marketing as content, zzzz.

Maybe this will be their version of New Coke /jk

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