Being new is the same as being wrong

There is a common Silicon Valley saying that “being early is the same as being wrong”, which can be true but is usually misleading. Products that invent a new category usually don’t fail because they’re “too early”, but because users don’t want the new category and never will.

Almost every successful product is a better version of something that already existed. Google was a better search engine, Chrome was a better web browser, and the iPhone was a better smartphone. Entirely new product categories are rare.