> and positioning the product correctly (i.e. text messaging instead of instant messaging).
Basically framing & marketing. Yes, that's important. But not exactly a technological innovation, rather finding a right set of words to convince the users to use existing technology.
> dismissing Dropbox’s legitimate innovation because rsync already existed.
There are substantial differences between what rsync did and what Dropbox did, especially in the area of storage and automation. rsync is just a tool to get bytes from point A to point B, Dropbox solves the end-user problem. Whatsapp doesn't add much to solutions that already existed - besides using phone number as ID instead of email, there's nothing different in UI or capabilities or solutions of this service that hadn't existed for decades before.
Uber and Lyft give me things I couldn't do before - i.e., get transportation cheap on 5-minutes notice. Whatsapp just rehashes what already existed for decades with a new label on the box. It was a successful label, good for them, but that is not what we talk about when we talk about innovations, usually.
Frankly haven't noticed any difference in UI.
> and positioning the product correctly (i.e. text messaging instead of instant messaging).
Basically framing & marketing. Yes, that's important. But not exactly a technological innovation, rather finding a right set of words to convince the users to use existing technology.
> dismissing Dropbox’s legitimate innovation because rsync already existed.
There are substantial differences between what rsync did and what Dropbox did, especially in the area of storage and automation. rsync is just a tool to get bytes from point A to point B, Dropbox solves the end-user problem. Whatsapp doesn't add much to solutions that already existed - besides using phone number as ID instead of email, there's nothing different in UI or capabilities or solutions of this service that hadn't existed for decades before.
Uber and Lyft give me things I couldn't do before - i.e., get transportation cheap on 5-minutes notice. Whatsapp just rehashes what already existed for decades with a new label on the box. It was a successful label, good for them, but that is not what we talk about when we talk about innovations, usually.