I have two arguments to counter this that contradict each other :)
One one hand, our entire economy is built on useless products. Chances are high that our good comfortable jobs involve making and marketing stuff people don’t really need at a larger scale than Tony’s solo projects. Large and so-called legitimate companies make billions and billions on things we don’t need. Coca-cola? Flavored sugar water that’s not good for you, you don’t need, and can make at home in seconds for a fraction of the price pulled in 44 billion last year for Coke. PepsiCo revenue was $86B. Starbucks: $32B, InBev: $58B. Does the global beverage industry top $1T? (Google says yes, many times over.) What about games and movies, fashion, apps, car accessories, music and sports equipment that’s unnecessarily high end and/or never gets used… the list is endless.
On the other hand, it’s not accurate or fair to call Tony’s products useless, because people paid for them. It’s reductive and low effort to frame them as simple, since he added a lot of features that don’t fit your summary. But if they save someone time, or someone likes the way they feel or look, and they pay for it, then it was useful for them. Don’t make the mistake of conflating the value you get, or your idea of what you pay for, for annyone else’s idea of usefulness.
> it’s not accurate or fair to call Tony’s products useless
I'll cede that point. Having an arrow on your Twitter profile is of some use to someone, and just because I've never had a problem with iPhone screen capture "press two buttons" doesn't mean some people need to click through an app, a nd the teletype style of GPT3 doesn't bother me but I guess some people need faster response.
I know snark is against the rules. Technically they aren't "useless" but they are single-task gadgets like you'd find for your kitchen drawer on QVC at night. The people that make the "banana slicer" probably made a ton of money and by your definition a "banana slicer" isn't useless because someone bought it.
> Obviously having an arrow on your Twitter profile is of some use to someone
One of the reasons your upper comment isn’t fair is because the story was about how he pivoted the product away from just showing the arrow & circle progress bar, and moved toward something more complex that does analytics reporting, and that’s when he actually started making money on it.
> I guess by your definition a “banana slicer” isn’t useless because someone bought it.
That was half of my definition. The other half, I think, probably agreed with yours, and points out that banana slicers are useless and we have an economy that is built on banana slicers. So, anyway, what is your definition of useful?
That's a good question. The naive definition would be something that someone uses to fulfill a purpose. I don't think a Bratz Doll on a Keychain in the store is useful, but my 5 year old niece will get a solid week of entertainment out of it. Sure that is useful, but do we want to compare it to a SawStop or iPhone? All of them are useful, but to different degrees, different people, and across varying lifespans.
You can argue that anything is useful if it is "used", but let's not pretend there isn't a spectrum here.
One one hand, our entire economy is built on useless products. Chances are high that our good comfortable jobs involve making and marketing stuff people don’t really need at a larger scale than Tony’s solo projects. Large and so-called legitimate companies make billions and billions on things we don’t need. Coca-cola? Flavored sugar water that’s not good for you, you don’t need, and can make at home in seconds for a fraction of the price pulled in 44 billion last year for Coke. PepsiCo revenue was $86B. Starbucks: $32B, InBev: $58B. Does the global beverage industry top $1T? (Google says yes, many times over.) What about games and movies, fashion, apps, car accessories, music and sports equipment that’s unnecessarily high end and/or never gets used… the list is endless.
On the other hand, it’s not accurate or fair to call Tony’s products useless, because people paid for them. It’s reductive and low effort to frame them as simple, since he added a lot of features that don’t fit your summary. But if they save someone time, or someone likes the way they feel or look, and they pay for it, then it was useful for them. Don’t make the mistake of conflating the value you get, or your idea of what you pay for, for annyone else’s idea of usefulness.