I remember when the first iPod came out.
My friend Adam got one. I thought it was ridiculous, and far too expensive.
When the iPhone came out, here’s what Steve Balmer from Microsoft had to say.
The thing is, when we are confronted by the new, we don’t know what to do.
It breaks our current mould of reality – which we typically don’t like.
In Balmer’s case, his inability to see the iPhone and the threat it caused was compounded by his position at Microsoft.
But for everyone else as well (except for the early adopters), this type of disruption creates conflict.
It is conflict in our belief systems (“phone shouldn’t be that expensive”), conflict in in our habits (“I don’t want to have my music in the same place as my phone”) and conflict in our systems and sunk costs (“my car doesn’t support playing music from this thing…”).
While the old is comfortable, the new creates discomfort.
When the new is also good, then we have something worth talking about.
