Is it just me or does beta scream cop-out to you too?

photo credit: theproducersperspective.com

At first it was a great idea.  Have a beta version and allow exclusive access to dedicated users/customers so they can use it and help you figure out all the glitches.  It’s like getting free manpower to test out the functionality of your product!  Then you could open it up to the public with minimal complaints.  Plus, your customers feel good about themselves because they got a sneak peek at your new product.  You get valuable feedback and they get to feel special.  Pretty good solution all around, huh?

Unfortunately, all good ideas can be misused and morph into something it wasn’t intially meant for.  At times, unforseen uses and changes can be good, but often it is not.  Nowadays, it seems companies use beta just as an excuse for any glitches that their product may have.  How many sites do you see that still have beta listed on a corner of the logo, even after weeks or months of being up?  At that point, beta is just a crutch for the companies so they can’t be blamed for malfunctions.  That’s how I see it anyway.  Would you ever buy a computer or car that was still considered beta?  It signals a certain higher risk rate and I know I wouldn’t go for something like that.

For the same reason, my mom doesn’t want me to buy new technology as soon as it becomes available.  I mentioned the new solar panel on the Prius 3rd generation and she warned me against using that sort of technology too soon (not that I wanted to buy such an ugly car, but the technology sure is awesome).  I mentioned this when with friends and Doc agreed – his family had bought a van with automatic sliding doors as soon as they became commerically available and ran into a lot of problems with that vehicle.  For the majority of people, it’s better to let others try something new first, then get it after it had reliably performed well for a period.  I guess that explains why there are so few early adopters out there!