Let me get the cheesy redundant joke done right off the bat:
On top of my list of things to get done is to finish Dave Allens Getting Things Done.
How droll. What fun.1
On top of the personal hit list of Andy Kim of The Potion Factory I’m willing to bet a few shillings you’ll find “Finish The Hit List Touch”, the fabled iPhone companion app to The Hit List Mac. I’m not sure that’s sound prioritizing though. I think perhaps he should bump up “Reconsider customer communication strategies” to number 1.
If you’re unacquainted with the app, its history and the state of things today, let me offer a brief summary.
In November 08 Andy posted a screenshot on his blog of “the new app I’ve been working on”. This app was released as a public preview in january 09 as The Hit List, an extremely well-designed task manager that is a delight to use. I’ve tried them all; Things, Omnifocus, TaskPaper and so forth, but The Hit List was the right app for me and for many others. Its focus on keyboard navigation, its navigability, its rewarding little *plonk* when you finish a task; It’s a helluvan app. From what I can gather the coming iPhone app was on the table already at this point as communicated in this panel in the THL settings.
I know for a fact that it was there when The Hit List was sold as part of the MacHeist bundle in june as it was one of the deciding factors for my purchasing the bundle. As an absolute minimum the iPhone app has been forthcoming for seven months, but I believe the reality is closer to 13 months. As of writing this post The Hit List desktop is at v0.9.3.18beta and the iPhone app is apparently residing somewhere along Duke Nukem Forever in vaporware limbo.
So software development takes time, and great software takes more time. These are facts I can appreciate. I don’t know how long Andy kept The Hit List to himself before revealing the screenshots and then releasing the public preview, but whatever amount of time he spent on it the results speak for themselves. I think he should have followed the same strategy when he decided to make an iPhone app. My twitter search for “@thehitlist” contains a lot of gushing praise, but mainly it looks like this.
The The Hit List Users Google Group is a bit more forgiving. I’d say it’s about 50/50 nags for news and encouragement and defense of Andy taking the time he needs. The latter camp of posters tend to berate those anxious for the app as “self-entitled”, which I find to be wholly inappropriate. Let me elaborate.
As I stated before; Software takes time. Alright. Some people were willing to wait 12 years for Duke Nukem. I don’t think THL has the same staying power, but the problem lies somewhere else than with the time it takes. The problem is that The Potion Factory has a barely existent and by proxy intolerably arrogant philosophy on communication with its customers. I’ve been monitoring the blog, the google group (both linked to above), both @andypotion and @thehitlist on Twitter and have thus managed to glean the handful of status updates on the presumably ongoing development. It’s meager stuff, usually dismissive and non-communicative. I remember waiting for Things Touch2 and although that too took longer than I liked there was a steady stream of information about the current status of the iPhone. I knew what was going on, and I felt I could rely on the app actually being released before I grew old, or indeed at all.
The communication problem regarding THL Touch extends beyond customers getting sour while they wait. It creates a feeling of distrust. How do we know the desktop app will be maintained? If I invest $70 in a piece of software I don’t expect new features free upgrades for life, but I do want to know that my app will still work with the next version of OSX. Will I get support? If the manufacturer isn’t talking to pissed off customers who really are only asking for a roadmap how likely is he to respond to my requests for help? Will the final version ship? There’s been no updates on the desktop app for months, even though there are heaps of people who have already paid for it. 3 This is, in short, not the way to create a good customer relationship.
Now I don’t have any insight on how any of this has affected sales (potential or actual) of The Hit List. But regardless of numbers I feel that this non-communication from Andy is just not the way you treat customers. Sure, what we want is for the app to be released, but what we crave is some info. Is it harder than you expected? We’ll understand that! Is there some personal reason it’s taking so long? We’ll commiserate and wait. Just tell us!
And if you’re just bored with the whole thing, and your lack of motivation is the cause of delay; Do the right thing. Open the gates for companies like Guided Ways, so that we who love The Hit List can take our tasks with us.
Footnotes:
- And in my case actually the plain truth. I’m still halfway through after trying both dead tree and audiobook. For now I’m settling for getting something done. ↩
- Yes, I am a fickle and disloyal customer. ↩
- Sorry, but “Preordering” is not supposed to be a gamble on whether or not you actually get the final product. ↩
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2 Comments
Great post on THL. The lack of communication on their site is brutal an can only deter people from investing in their great app. I’ve looked at Things and other apps but none of them are as simple as THL in my opinion.
THL looks just as good as Things but more importantly I use it on a daily basis to keep on top of my various tasks. Thanks for the post.
I’ve been scouring the web for evidence that Andy is alive and well. While nearly non-existent, there’s still some evidence that he hasn’t dropped off the face of the earth here: http://github.com/andypotion
We can only speculate about THL and the future of one of the best to do list apps in the world, but I imagine that Andy has either been recruited for much bigger things or is deep in the code, trying to come up with something new.
It’s tough when you’re the only person working on such a big project. I just wish Andy would use his success to his advantage and finish this beautiful product.