Product: Dualities

Attention vs Privacy Online — Getting noticed online usually means giving up something about yourself.
Cathedral vs Bazaar — Two models for building software: the closed cathedral or the open bazaar.
Correlation vs Causation — Two things moving together doesn't mean one caused the other.
Demand-Side and Supply-Side — Most companies think from the supply side. The best ones think from the demand side.
Needs vs Wants — People say they need one thing and buy another.
Organic vs Mechanic Growth — You can grow by pumping fuel or by building an engine.
Principles Over Processes — Strong principles let you skip most process. Weak principles demand heavy process.
Push vs Pull — You can push products onto users or pull users toward them.
Service vs Product — Services scale with headcount. Products scale without it.
Simple vs Easy — Simple means few moving parts. Easy means familiar and close at hand.
Startup vs Small Business Growth — Two legitimate paths — and conflating them ruins both.
Visualisation vs Documentation — If you can show the logic in the UI, don't just describe it in the docs.
What the Thing IS vs What the Thing DOES — Describing a product by its parts is not the same as describing what it does for people.
Wide vs Narrow Positioning — Be something to many, or everything to few.

Other Product types: Concepts · Principles · Advice · Tools

Dualities in other domains: Leadership · Systems