It’s easy to argue that features are purely good. One might take the stance that they don’t get in the way unless the user needs them, and then they are welcome. But look at that hallway. None of those new doors are “in your way.” Yet most people will find themselves curious about what’s behind them. And what’s behind each door varies greatly. Preferences is a door with a few buttons, but Color Correction is a door to a ton of control and power. Playback is barely a closet. Transcoding is actually another exit.
Is there stuff beyond these doors you should be using? Or is it safe to ignore them? If you open Color Correction first, you might think that every door has a big, powerful room behind it. If you open Playback first, you might think each door is just a pantry.
It’s hard for us developers to realize that people are terrified of using our apps wrong.
When you start adding doors, you add distractions, yes — but worse, you create a sense of unease in the user. Your app is now a Skinner Box; the doors offering unpredictable rewards. Every door is something new to learn. Every door is an opportunity to use the app wrong.
If the user has any other way to get their work done — even a terrible one, they will respond to this feeling by not using the app. This is what happened with BulletProof. People didn’t use it because we gave them too many chances to use it wrong.
Too many doors.
Photoshop is All Doors
Think of your friend who is really good at Photoshop. The one who uses it every day for work. The expert. Call them up and ask them how to do something simple, like mask one layer with another’s luminance. I guarantee you they’ll say something like: “Well, I know there are better ways, but this is how I do it...”
“I know there are better ways of doing it” really means “I haven’t opened all the doors, so I’m sure I’m using Photoshop wrong.”
Eliminating Doors Means Saying No
I listen to a lot of podcasts. I’ve tried a few third-party podcast apps for iOS, but always came back to the buggy and annoying Apple Podcasts app. When Marco Arment, creator of Instapaper and The Magazine, released Overcast, it took me less than a day to switch over to it for 100% of my podcast listening.
The other podcast apps seemed to compete with Apple's free offering by adding more features. Overcast won me as a paid user with a couple of well-chosen features, but mostly with its minimal doors.
Marco hosts his own podcast called ATP, and has appeared on a few others discussing the development of the app. He’s been candid about design decisions both in these interviews and on Twitter. Maybe my favorite of his tweets on the subject was this one (since deleted):