[btcboss]

"If you handed them a brick they would still grab it and try to hit themselves on the head to put out the fire. You need to find problems so dire that users are willing try half-baked, v1, imperfect solutions."

this kind of falls into line with Reid Hoffman's famous quote:

"If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late."

I think these statements paint a wide brush and fail particularly for products whose main value prop is ease of use.

If your product's core value prop is UI/UX/ease of use, you cannot deliver that with a buggy half finished product. And if you cannot deliver the value you intend to provide, then you are shooting yourself in the foot, spooking users losing their trust in your ability to deliver.

Obviously each product is different, but I think specifically for this type, these methodologies should be omitted. Because the most likely case is that your customer is already solving the problem with a "brick", whether that is your competition or a home made solution that they have created. Handing them another brick will not suffice.

[PeterisP]

"If your product's core value prop is UI/UX/ease of use" then you're obviously not entering/creating a new market, nor you are attempting to find a product/market fit, are you?

It pretty much implies that you're attempting to overtake existing competitors who have found product/market fit, where people have options to fill their need but do so grudgingly because of their UX quality. Doing that can be a solid business plan, but it's very, very different from the type of new-product-discovery startups that Reif Hoffman was talking about.

If the people are paying for an existing crappy product with poor UI/UX, then that illustrates a valid need and building an easier-to-use product can greatly increase the size of that market.

However, if currently people are not eager to pay for that need, then I'd wager that simply providing UI/UX/ease of use won't change that. If their need isn't sufficient to put up with the minor bother of sucky UX (at least for 10% of most needy part of the market), then that need isn't also sufficient to put up with the much larger bother of paying you adequately.

[btcboss]

"then you're obviously not entering/creating a new market, nor you are attempting to find a product/market fit, are you?"

Yeah, and if you were entering/creating a new market, usually people do not understand why they need the product you are creating and thus the original analogy still does not work.

Overall I just feel the brick analogy is not great because there are no low hanging fruits anymore. If a problem is so painful, there must exist a competitor OR a home made solution.

Agree with the rest of your statements.

[PeterisP]

Actually, if I think about this more, then the brick analogy is very useful - if you see someone (or better yet, some whole industry/niche) beating themselves on the head with a metaphorical brick, then this means that they have a very, very important problem and most likely if anyone came to them and told that they have a solution that's simply unpolished but solves most of the problem without hitting your head with the home made brick-solution then the expected response to this description would be "shut up and take my money!".