Products as Mediums of Expression
What do Instagram, Snapchat and Tinder all have in common?
They are medium’s of expression. I like to study the success of disruptive products to discover correlations between their successes. Previously, I argued that disruptive products at their core perform some form of magic.
My insight leads me to believe that mainstream social tech products are successful because they enable people to be what they want to be — that is they provide a medium for people to express themselves in ways where previously fear constrained them.
A universal human problem
The core social problem most humans face is that of FEAR. Its the universal constant that prevents us from thinking big, speaking our minds or pursuing our goals. The most successful social platforms appear to excel at identifying instances in which fear constrain us. They then provide well designed product solutions that act as couriers or mediums through which we can express ourselves free of fear.
The key to their product design is a crystal clear identification of a specific instance in which fear prevented someone from behaving the way they wished and providing a solution laser focused on eliminating those fears in that particular instance.
Top mainstream social mediums of expression
Instagram is where we go to sell our fantasies. We all seek social validation from our peers because it eliminates our fear of not being socially acceptable.
While professional photographers previously had a monopoly on selling visual fantasies, Instagram brought that ability to the masses by leveraging the smartphone and introducing filters as couriers/mediums of expression so that anyone could sell socially acceptable instances of themselves.
Snapchat
Snapchat is the antithesis of Instagram. They identified fear as the primary constraint preventing people from communicating naturally with their peers.
The simple innovation of disappearing messages was a mechanism that relieved the fear brought on by the permanency of social content. This in turn enabled a social medium of expression that best mimicked real-life where in real life, moments are short-lived then disappear.
Tinder
Tinder identified that when two individuals had a strong attraction to each other, the fear of rejection prevented them from engaging each other. Their solution to this problem was the double opt-in mechanism wherein they can anonymously express their liking for the other without the other knowing until both individuals opted-in. It’s in this instance that the fear of rejection is eliminated.
Bonus: Kanye West
Kanye West is a medium of expression too. At a time when pop culture was dominated by gangsta rap, he influenced a generation that was into gangsta rap but never identified with the lifestyle to express themselves naturally in music and fashion without being labeled “uncool”, “emo”, “gay”, or whatever.
Just google how your favourite hip hop artist dressed in 2004 (The year The College Dropout came out) and today (You will laugh).
For those of us who grew up in the early 2000’s, the fear of being uncool is definitely what had us wearing clothes 10x our size😂.
