Ask HN: Is the Lean Startup Methodology Overrated? - ajaaar
======
ehacke
I think it's a bit of a fake idea in the sense that you ALWAYS want to ship
the most minimal thing you can, as soon as you can. But what that means will
depend on the company, the product, and the market.

The tough part is figuring out what the MVP actually is for your situation. It
might be a Shopify site that just sends you an email when someone bought your
widget, or it might be a multi-year R&D effort that ends with Falcon 1 being
launched.

I also think that the "Lean Startup" concept is often abused by people to
justify cutting corners on things they should not. The prime example is paying
zero attention to code quality and testing prior to launch, then failing to
get traction because the product is so buggy and unusable that the customers
don't stick around. Don't over-architect and over-test something that may not
sell, but some amount of design and proper engineering is necessary to ensure
that you have something worth buying.

------
Liron
No. I've been blogging a lot about how it's actually underrated:

[https://medium.com/@lironshapira/how-to-sanity-check-your-
st...](https://medium.com/@lironshapira/how-to-sanity-check-your-startup-idea-
dbb3ad4c9888)

[https://medium.com/@lironshapira/when-not-to-be-a-lean-
start...](https://medium.com/@lironshapira/when-not-to-be-a-lean-
startup-8e974b28dbf4)

[https://bloatedmvp.com](https://bloatedmvp.com)

------
PaulHoule
Yes.

It might be OK if you're trying to make a cheaper razor, but if you want to
develop something technically ambitious at all it is about as a good advice as
"How to Win Friends and Influence People" is good advice for an Aspie.

