Can you 'cover' a feature?
People writing about software love this word: 'cloning'. Friendfeed's new beta allegedly cloned Twitter's activity feeds feature, but Facebook allegedly cloned Friendfeed's aggregation feature earlier . I do not like the notion of cloning or copying a feature, because the metaphor is utterly inaccurate.
From my point of view, a better term would be 'covering' a feature. For one, I love cover versions in music, I could spend hours browsing secondhandsongs or finding rare gems in the last.fm covers tag radio. And just as in music, there can be a lot more variation when covering a feature then when simply cloning it.
So Friendfeed's new beta is really a bit like twitter, but they are covering it just like Franz Ferdinand is covering the Beatles' "This Boy", giving it new energy and speed.
On the other hand, covers can simply go wrong. This applies to software as well as to music, but the difference is that awkward covers in music can be quite entertaining, while in software they are most of the time embarrassing to all involved parties.
Next time you are covering a feature, try to make the best out of the cover version, so that your software is able to fit into this equation.
Filed under //
beatles
erdmöbel
feature
franz ferdinand
friendfeed
innovation
joe cocker
product management
twitter
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