James Hong, co-founder of HOTorNOT, recently wrote about some radical restructuring his company is going through. From what I’ve read, James is either not happy with, or not proud of his business, which is reported to have been driving $4M in annual revenue with just 2 people. The new plan: stop milking the cash cow, ‘finish’ their idea, restart and redeploy the popular site.
As much as I want to believe that enhancing design and functionality always improves how a service is received, it just isn’t the case. Some audiences react negatively to certain levels of ‘finish.’ If you’re wondering, yes, I’m talking about you MySpace.
Keep this part quiet, but we actually work with at least one audience that responds in similar fashion. Sometimes ugly converts. It’ll be interesting to see how it goes for James and co.