[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!".