Why Color Failed.
I just finished reading Sean Scott’s explanation for why Color died, which reduces Color’s failure to a combination of launching in a no-data environment, and insufficient explanation of the app for first-time users. This reads as an over-simplification considering the imagination and ambition of the team, and the magnitude of its failure. So, let’s take a trip down memory lane…
When Color launched in 2011, it attempted to do four things simultaneously:
- Complex UI
- Group photo sharing
- Location-based connectivity
- Ephemerality
Complex UI. Memory betrays me. Hidden, complex and otherwise unexplained user-interactions made Color difficult to grok on first use; Color’s app update admitted as much. 4-years on, their interactions don’t seem so mind-blowing, but they were definitely new for their time.
That being said, I don’t think the UI alone killed color since the UI didn’t stop early adopters like myself and Alexa from having fun with the app. Personally, I thought the interactions and multi-use buttons were pretty cool (they were definitely innovative for their epoch), and users could have grown to love them over time. But then again, Color had other problems…
Group photo sharing was a fantastic idea, and in my opinion is still an idea-space that holds big potential. Color’s mistake was in attempting to control how users could create and contribute to albums, and how they could interact on the service (album creation, sharing and invitations, location-restrictions). Each restriction hindered speed-to-use, and made it difficult to engage in the creative experience.
What would have worked better:
* The ability to create an album. Declare the album as public, private, or semi-private (some combination of Facebook friends or friends-of-friends).
* Easy onboarding via SMS/Facebook/other.
* Scrapping the location-restrictions entirely, and handing trust over to friendship networks not to spam an event feed inappropriately.
Location-based connectivity was interesting. It played on the concept of seeing what’s going on in the world around you, perhaps through a friend, perhaps through a stranger. This was pretty ambitious for the time, as a photo-exchange with a stranger is far more personal and intrusive than a tweet. Also bear in mind that the nascent rise of Instagram was far from all-conquering, and Grindr was the only effective location-based-networking-app (arguably, this is still the case).
Unfortunately, Color’s location-based restrictions were worse than prohibitive — their force was extinguishing. If you weren’t within a mile of another user who was recently active, then the Color experience was one of total isolation. Yobongo, a location-based messaging app of a similar era, was far more pragmatic: expand the location restrictions up until the point that there is network density (users * activity), and then reduce the perimiter size gradually from there as more users come online. Yobongo ultimately failed, but they demonstrated a useful technique for others who may attempt to bootstrap a Color-clone.
Ephemerality.
Man. Where to start? Color’s insistence on deleting photos and albums from an inactive area was infuriating (“inactive” meant no activity for ~24hrs). It essentially left no history for users which exacerbated the empty-network problem (no content, as well as no people). This deletion also left a lingering sense when taking a photo of “well what’s the point?”. This seriously pissed off a lot of early adopters and I believe killed the core of what could have otherwise have become a vibrant Color subculture.
Admittedly, this might never have been the point. Perhaps Color was always intended to be ephemeral. Unfortunately, it was communicated to users as a photo album, and photo albums are forever linked in our psyche as permanent artifacts.
On the other hand, there is something to ephemerality that goes beyond sending dick-picks to one another. Ephemeral energy has a magic to it that just cannot be replicated. Anyone who has experienced Burning Man, Freespace, StartupBus, or anything truly ephemeral knows this as a truth.
“Magic Energy” might not make for a good business, but I suspect anything that gives you such good vibes is worth exploring.
Summation:
Ultimately, I believe Color was a product failure. It attempted to do too much, and pushed the boundaries of what users were comfortable with. What saddens me is that this is exactly the type of risk-taking and experimentation that should be admired and supported, instead of ridiculed as has so often been the case. Worse, the backlash from Color’s massive fundraising haul led to a pendulum swing and near-fanaticism in the adoption of the Lean Startup movement, which I respect and loath in equal measure.
Color may have ended up more an artists’s folly than the Facebook of our era, but we should commend their team for trying. Innovation, even when taken to the point of absurdity, extends our horizon.
