AT&T's Product Management Fail - aka The HTC One X Launch

Posted by kylebernhardt on May 16, 2012 11:15 pm 9

The decision to lock the bootloader of the otherwise beautiful and capable HTC OneX illustrates an acute blindspot by the Product Management leadership responsible for the launch of this phone at AT&T (PMs are the ones who make these calls). That blind spot is the network effect of tinkerers on the broader customer ecosystem.

When a company delivers this type of significantly negative customer experience to this community, the impact can be much further reaching that just the relatively small community of users who are impacted. Time and again executives in these roles have illustrated their 2005-level model of customer behavior and networking throughout their customer base, and this is unfortunately another example.

I'm guessing the thought process that lead to this decision likely went along the lines of "the people who want to unlock the bootloader are a small number and only want to scam our paid services model". This is an easy assumption to make, but unfortunatelty not a very well informed one. There are many users who value the improved user experience that can be delivered by custom ROMs/Kernels, and are willing to deal with the complexity of the flashing process to get there.

If that person has those capabilties, then they are likely to have honed them through a lifetime that also involves a network of people who trust their technology opinion. They also are likely to have a similar technology savvy across social media platforms, which makes their reach much greater.

I'm one of those people, and I'm extremely disappointed with the customer experience AT&T has decided to deliver to this device. To boot, I'm also a product management professional that does a facepalm when I see this type of decision-making ineptitude on display for the internet to laugh at, and customers to rage about.

It's 2012; embrace your tinkerers, learn from them, and reap the wider benefits to your customer base. Don't put on a tin foil hat and build arbitrary walls.