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A comment on The One-Person Product. Parent comment

Re:The One-Person Product by tinco on Tuesday May 21, 2013 @06:30PM (#5747437)
Their revenue was selling the product at more than its cost price. He pushed Woz to build a great product. I think it was Woz himself who was obsessed with also making it cheap to manufacture.

I am not saying that Steve Jobs did not intend to have profit, I'm saying that reasoning about revenue was not a limiting part of the product establishment.

If it was, how do you explain the launch of the iPod?

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Re:The One-Person Product by joelrunyon on Tuesday May 21, 2013 @10:54PM (#5748572)
You're confusing two ideas.

With Apple, the revenue model is always clear - even with the iPod - Steve Jobs just knew he could create something that people would buy. He didn't launch the iPod and then worry about how he was going to make money off of it - it was always very clear to him - he was going to sell a ton of them.

Tumblr still hasn't figured out a revenue model. They still have to fit that into their product. Being able to do so & do it successfully is integral to their product - otherwise it's just a cool tool that they're letting millions of people use for free.

That was never the issue with Apple.

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