The Secret Sauce of Writely

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Oct 5
2005

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The Secret Sauce of Writely

I spent a fun hour talking with Sam Schillace of Writely. We talked about the uptake (enormous) and different approaches to the idea of word processing on the web, but two things really stuck with me: platform and people. Every entrepreneur wants there to be a secret sauce for success--if you use Ajax, or Linux, or tagging, or (insert delicious top tag du jour) you'll have a great product. Sam's secret sauce isn't platform.

That said, the platform is interesting. Writely is written in C# and deployed on Windows boxes. This isn't interesting because of "oooh, he's using The Enemy" or any nonsense like that, it's interesting because this makes it the first Web 2.0 success that I can think of that was written in .NET. That's an interesting datapoint in and of itself. The reason for choosing C#, other than "we had Visual Studio laying around", was the integrated debugging of browser and server components. He demo'd it for me, and it's mindblowingly useful. It is to Venkman as Venkman is to alert("foo has value " + foo).

That's platform. It's nerdy and that's cool, but people is what still has me thinking. Writely has a three-person team at its core, and one of the core team has thousands of hours of user experience research. The engineers come from a desktop app background. This is important because, as Sam said, the desktop is a mature field. The average desktop app has hundreds of subtleties and nuances to their use that the average web app does not. If you're building an Ajax application and taking advantage of richer UI possibilities, you need that fine sensibility to avoid producing an unusable abomination. An analogy might be to desktop publishing: when people first could use any font and put any text anywhere, they did. And they shouldn't have. The best desktop publishers came from the print world and had the sensitivities honed by years of old-school design.

The same is true in the web world. Look at successful companies like Flickr and 37signals--there's someone in those companies who's as worried about the user on the front-end as the other people are worried about the servers on the back-end. I'm tempted to generalize and say that behind every successful Web 2.0 company there'll be someone who understands the user. I know that's not guaranteed always to be true--someone with a crappy product will be acquired because they're lucky. But in general I think we've gone from a time when high concept was enough to get you an exit, to a time when you have to prove yourself with users. The key to that is understanding the user.

This might be the Return of the Designer or the Revenge of the UX Guru, but I prefer to see it as the Need to Please. Not just in the macrocosm of "solve a problem the user has" but in the microcosm of "every aspect of this app should behave the way real users expect". If there's a secret sauce to Writely, it's this merciless focus on the user. And as both a user of technology and a creator of one, I love it.

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Comments: 16

Geof Harries [10.05.05 03:21 PM]

Finally, us UX web guys get some respect, yo.

Ed Daniel [10.06.05 05:14 AM]

I came across this during one of my surfing sessions:

http://www.zohowriter.com/Home.do

csven [10.06.05 12:05 PM]

As I'm sure you're aware, thinking of the user goes well beyond software (and in my case, product). It goes beyond understanding what they should do. It goes, as you correctly point out, to users doing things they shouldn't; to the inexplicable and completely baffling. Unfortunately, most technical types tend to have a hard time putting themselves in the shoes of these kinds of users (until I went from engineering to design, I didn't understand).

I'm more tempted to generalize and say that behind every company which is successful over the long term, there'll be someone in a position to influence product who understands the user.

Peter Semmelhack [10.07.05 08:28 AM]

If you want inspiration and confirmation of the importance of focusing on the user you should read everything available on Scott Cook and Intuit. There's no better example of the benefits.

Dharmesh Shah [11.05.05 07:17 AM]

I agree totally on the criticality of finding a web usability and interface expert for Internet software companies.

One of the challenges (at least for me) is not knowing where to look for these people. Where do the truly gifted usability people hang-out? How does one go about finding them? I need to recruit one for my latest fledling startup, but they seem very difficult to locate.

Mike [11.18.05 10:38 AM]

I was doing desktop when the internet bubble came and went. I found out that I had to learn net technology and have, very well. Now I am hoping that my desktop background brought to the web will be useful. Users do the darndest things, but my code knows their desires and follys.
Now I just have to get a new yob that wants me to do that.
Enjoy, Mike

gerry [11.29.05 08:35 PM]

It seems to me that Writely is just a "get rich quick" scheme. Grow a good, useful service using .NET and then sell yourself to the *enemy* Microsoft. Profit!! It's NOT really about the user, ultimately. It's more about maintaining the M$ monopoly and all its associated dirty tactics and selling your soul to the Devil (Microsoft). Microsoft will fold Writely technologies into its own offerings down the road. Don't use Writely IF you want don't want the Microsoft Monopoly to continue. I should now as I have "insider" knowledge.

Ray [11.30.05 10:50 AM]

Peter,

As a reluctant user of Intuit products, I don't see that they have any experience in the "importance of focusing on the user". If there is "no better example" then we are in trouble.

Intuit products are nightmares of user experience: windows flapping open and closed without reason, bizarre defaults, and weird naviagation. The only reason that I remain a user is that I am locked in by my bank.

I think that you have been deluded by Intuit's press coverage claiming to care about the user experience, but you should be asking an actual user.

gnat [12.01.05 04:36 PM]

Hi, gerry. Thanks for passing on the inside knowledge--good thing Writely's not publicly listed or I'd suspect you were trying to drive the price up to make Microsoft pay more! Most web apps, and I include Writely in this, have no particular proprietary cleverness about them to mean that someone else couldn't clone them if they went away. So I'd expect to see a Writeness or Writetastic or Writr or whatever, some other product with the same functionality, if Microsoft acquired and messed up Writely and there was still a need for an unmessed Writely. It'd take only about a month to get a basic functional clone working.

Uwe Keim [03.09.06 01:33 PM]

Interesting read! We do have the same philosophy: Act fast and friendly to customer questions and feedback.

Achtung Heiss [03.10.06 03:57 AM]

Hey, how about that "insider" info that Writely will be sold to Microsoft? Good call, Gerry!

albuca [03.11.06 08:38 AM]

Hey, gerry at November 29, 2005 08:35 PM.
Tell your inside knowledge sources: You're Fired!
"Google Acquires Writely
Google has announced that it has purchased the company that makes Writely, the Web-based word processing system. PC Magazine discusses the purchase: etc etc"

Igor [03.13.06 09:32 AM]

This service has huge potential, its nice to see its in good hands. Making Web applications look like native window applications has been our goal as well, its not an easy task.

Joe Doaks [06.15.06 12:28 PM]

Gerry is just another of the Internet blowhards who wants the world to think s/he "has the info" -- when all s/he is doing is blowing smoke from the butt.

Paxton Billups [11.16.06 10:08 PM]

Pioneering screenwriter Nigel Kneale, best known for the Quatermass TV serials and films, dies aged 84...

Paxton Billups [11.16.06 10:08 PM]

Pioneering screenwriter Nigel Kneale, best known for the Quatermass TV serials and films, dies aged 84...