A Google user
Kevin Maney’s Trade-off is about the constant exchange of fidelity and convenience. The concept Kevin Maney lays out is insightful when loosely applied, but doesn’t hold up under a lot of scrutiny. Maney argues that the trade off between convenience, price + availability, and fidelity, aura+identity+experience, is a zero-sum trade. You can’t have more convenience without getting less fidelity and vice versa. Maney warns against chasing something he calls the fidelity mirage, which is both high fidelity and high convenience, but both are measured relative to the nearest competitor , which means achieving the fidelity mirage only adjusts the baseline for comparison. Google seems to be high fidelity and high convenience. It’s free, it’s on every internet enabled computer and my phone, while at the same time being much higher fidelity than other search engines. Is Google a fidelity mirage, or is there a flaw in how fidelity and convenience are being measured?
Possibly, I’m being too critical. Trade-off provides a useful framework for how to position a product or a brand, some clues into the long-term viability of a company, and even a little enlightenment into experiences and products around us.
Kevin Maney’s writing style is neat and clear. He does a great job of explaining a complex topic in a way that doesn’t make it seem overwhelming. Overall this a good book and well worth my time, but I don’t think it’s my first recommendation to anyone.