Path rolled out Path 2 this week.
The technospere gushed about its gorgeousness. They were right in doing so as it is indeed gorgeous. Maybe the nicest looking iPhone app I’ve seen. Looks will only take you so far though and I’m not sure how and if Path will ever fit into anyone’s daily routine.
Path is now marketing itself as “The Smart Journal”. A bit of a pivot from the photo sharing only world. Really though, behind the glossy finish it’s just an aggregated sharing app for pics, places, thoughts, status updates, and now it seems music listening habits, too. A literal hodgepodge of all the popular verticals out there right now. I would have really liked to see Path take a different, pardon the pun, path. Instead they seemed to jump on a bandwagon made up of hobbled together verticals.
That begs the question: Are users looking for one place to do all their sharing or do they want specific places to share specific info? Personally I fall into the latter group and think most other users do as well. A dedicated vertical offers a much better experience in my opinion. Plus much more passionate, knowledgable, engaged users. You can see that already with the firmly entrenched vertical players. Instagram for pics, Foursquare for places, Facebook and Twitter for thoughts and status, Tumblr for creative blogging, and I like to selfishly believe exfm for music.
So will a shiny top coat of slick sway folks toward Path? I don’t think so. There is a huge added obstacle that no one really mentioned while heaping all that pretty praise on Path. That is of course no one is really “on” Path yet. That’s a problem and makes the service none too valuable. Moreover, I along with a lot of other folks don’t want to have to set up yet another account then refollow, reinvite or find a bunch of new friends just so a service is of value. (Related, it’s why I’ve already deleted Oink.)
Another way to think of it is like Blu Ray Discs. Ever see one? They were amazing. Beautiful, crisp, some nice bonus features not available on DVD, etc. But, the selection was weak, and once you got past the initial gush factor you realized it wasn’t all that much better than DVDs. So users returned to where the selection was (i.e. users in the case of the analogy). The luster was gone and the Blu Ray died a relatively quick death.
I don’t know if that will happen with Path. Maybe they’ll prove me wrong and flourish. I just don’t see it. I think you have to do something exponentially better, not just a prettier copy that combines what everyone else is doing. We’ll see. Beauty fades though while functionality and a engaged user base doesn’t.
kirklove