Product or tool
A media that has the characteristic of a product, is a media designed with the primary purpose to inform the reader. There’s little interaction with the reader, who mainly consumes the produced content passively. The media itself is not supporting the reader in whatever action the user wants to take - e.g. not fascilitating conversation, sharing, storing, contribution etc. A product is often a finished whole without the user.
A media that has the characteristic of a tool, is a media that the end-user uses to do/create something with rather than just consume. For example digg.com and del.icio.us is more than a product for consumption, as it can be used to store bookmarks for later retrieval. Their respective front pages can still be used as just a product, but it has a big focus on the tool part. A media with the characteristic of a tool will often be an unfinished whole without the user.
Thoughts:
Product and tool is two opposites that rarely will characterize a media completely, but many of the design decisions and the way the layout is presented shows the underlying design purpose. It can be argued that digg.com is less of a tool than del.icio.us is. Most would probably agree that The New York Times is a product.
Analysis
As the terms product and tool are two extremes of a graduated scale, most medias are not one of the other, and any analysis will be subject to discussion.
The New York Times: Product
del.icio.us: Tool
jezebel.com: Product
boingboing.com: Product
newstrust.org: Tool
Monocle Magazine: Product
reddit.com: Tool
digg.com: Tool
technorati.com: Tool
techmeme.com: Product
Google News: Product (for news consumption) and tool (for search and alerts)
daylife.org: Product
Newsblogger: Tool
huffingtonpost.com: Product
talkingpointsmemo.com: Product
RSS reader: Tool
5 Comments, Comment or Ping
Lars K Jensen
It depends on how you define ‘tool’. A ‘project’ can be a tool’. Often at tool actually is a product of some kind of production.
For instance, most news media sites are, obviously, products. But they are also tools. Tools that make it possible for the user to find out, what has happened in the world.
So it’s all in the definitions ;-)
// Lars
Aug 28th, 2007
Jeppe Kabell
I definitely follow you on that, and true - it’s all in the definition. And even though the model “Tool - product” isn’t waterproof, I still think there is a lot of truth to it, especially when you see the progression: “New York Times, Digg.com, del.icio.us” - don’t you think?
Remember that the goal here is to have useful words/concepts for being creative. Maybe it’s the word ‘product’ that isn’t good in contrast to tool? Any suggestions for better words?
Aug 30th, 2007
Mads
Well, you can say that the product is the result of using the tool, and therefore your focus should be on the word PROCESS.
Aug 30th, 2007
Jeppe Kabell
Mads, so you would say process vs. product?
Aug 31st, 2007
Mads
In my believe, that would make a lot more sense. It is in the process that you gain experience to “develop a creative catalogue”. If you only focus on premade tools, you will end up being a product yourself and thereby being the exact thing you advocate against. In simple terms it is not the tool or the product, but how you use it.
Sep 3rd, 2007
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