[cix]

Sorry but you're vastly underestimating the power of marketing. "Yo" was basically an entirely marketing play, same with Flappy Bird, and their are several more examples. Candy Crush is by no means innovative, they polished an existing flash game that had been around for ages and marketed it correctly. Examples through counter examples; Bing will never succeed, simply because the brand has been devalued to a point that such migration is impossible. Amazon cannot make it in hardware no matter their innovation, because of how deeply invested people are with Apple/Google. I am sorry to say that in some respects; it is you with the blindspot.

[cix]

That being said their are also examples of what you say working, but I have spoke to many people who have worked on AAA titles on mobile which have spent millions on R&D, with the best possible designers and developers, only to have a game like flappy bird outdo them. This is not only about being innovative, in fact it's sometime not, but rather having a anti-attitude to what the current market is in order to differentiate. Making an app for kids? Ask kids what they want, having a holier than though approach is only going to kick yourself in the face.

[m3mnoch]

so, you're going to tell us that "yo" isn't the very definition of hitting the app lottery?

edit: and i believe you're conflating "marketing" with "coverage for hitting the lottery".

[cix]

Their is also a lot of evidence to show Flappy Bird's position in the top apps placement was because of gray hat marketing.

[cix]

Read the story of how it came to be, it was marketing. Keep in mind also the name itself is a huge reason for this.

[m3mnoch]

again, you're conflating "marketing" with "coverage for hitting the lottery".

from this article: http://www.haaretz.com/business/start-up-of-the-week/1.59991...

  They decided to release the app to the App Store, 
  and people slowly started hearing about it. The 
  first serious buzz happened when blogger ad technical 
  Robert Scoble wrote about Yo after a visit to Israel. 
  He called it “the stupidest” but “most addicting” app.

  Thus the Yo app became the conversation of the day 
  among the startup crowd in Silicon Valley and New 
  York, who tweeted how excited they were at using it. 
  As interest burgeoned, Arbel moved to San Francisco 
  last week.

[cix]

You proved my point " The first serious buzz happened when blogger ad technical Robert Scoble wrote about Yo after a visit to Israel. He called it “the stupidest” but “most addicting” app." Until then no-one knew about it, what is that called marketing. Are you going to down-vote me because you're wrong? How about Flappybird? That didn't gain any traction until the #1 Youtube video maker PewDiePie made a video on how much he hated it.

[simonh]

Marketing is a deliberate attempt to promote a product with the intention of selling it. If the authors or publishers of Yo approached Scoble or the Youtuber and persuaded them to feature their product, that's marketing. If Scoble or the Youtuber came across these apps on their own and randomly decided to mention them then that's not marketing, it's just luck.

[cix]

Are we going to argue semantics on HN? If I show my app to anyone, which he did. Whether it is a news station or my mom it is marketing. He didn't just magically see it, the developer specifically showed him. You also have no idea if the Youtube video was influenced by the developer do you? I have worked with game streamers and had them promote some of our products; it's not hard. Feel free to post a dictionary definition of "marketing" if you want to continue this pointless debate on semantics.

[walterbell]

On the topic of online buzz, see Ryan Holiday's book, "Trust Me, I'm Lying", https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/ryan-holiday/trus...

[cix]

Marketing and propaganda are very similar, if people believe something to be true. It is.

A lot of these famous social accounts aren't even the people in the photos. It's kinda disturbing once you get deep, everything seems so fake.

[cix]

People like you poison this site's ecosystem. Anytime you receive any counter to your misguided opinion you can silence the dissent by down-voting. Nothing you have said provides a insightful counter to anything I have said. You are just trying to bury my responses because you know you are wrong. It's disgusting, I thought this site was better than this.

[m3mnoch]

fyi - i can't downvote. not enough karma or something. /shrug

so, it's not me.