A fundamental notion in business is to outdo and go one better than the competition. Fried delves into the competitive advantage of doing less, suggesting that people start thinking about "under-doing" each other to beat the competition in this era of simple applications. He presents arguments against conventional business building practices and proposes scaling down on money, staff, and product features to make time more valued and productive.
Time management comes to the forefront as Fried outlines a time frame that revolves around the functional customer experience. His presentation accentuates the reality that, while in any business there are a million simple problems to solve, simplicity remains the key.
Jason Fried is the founder and CEO of 37signals, an influential Chicago-based web application design firm. 37signals' BASECAMP (web-based project management), BACKPACK (web-based personal information management), and TA-DA LIST (web-based to-do lists) products are used on a daily basis by tens of thousands of people and small businesses in over 50 countries.
37signals believes that software should do less, not more, allowing people to solve their own problems their own way and then get out of their way. Simpler, faster, more focused web-based products are where it's at and 37signals is leading the revolution.
37signals' agile "Getting Real" methods are also changing the way people design, engineer, and build businesses on the web. Ruby on Rails, the open-source web-application framework developed by 37signals, is powering many Web 2.0 products including all of 37signals' products, ODEO, 43things, and many others launching soon.
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