WHY SIMPLE THINGS SCALE
Have you ever looked at the top of the charts whether it’s music, politicians, or business ideas and thought, “This isn’t even that good. Why is it so popular?”
The song is just three chords. The politician speaks in vague slogans. The product does one boring thing. Meanwhile, you know a dozen complex, nuanced, brilliant alternatives that nobody cares about.
It feels unfair. But it’s not unfair. It’s evolutionary.
Simple scales. Complex fails.
The Mathematics of “Good Enough”
Stephen Hawking once said that for every equation he put in a book, his sales would be halved. He was right.
If you have an idea that takes 15 minutes to explain, it will never leave the room. If you have an idea that fits on a bumper sticker, it can travel the world.
This is why “Eat the rich” travels faster than a 30-page economic thesis on wealth redistribution. It’s why monotheism (One God, One Rulebook) scaled faster than complex, abstract paganism, even religions like hinduism didn’t scale due to its open-endedness . It isn’t because the simple answer is always right its because the simple answer is portable.
The Complexity Trap
Smart people fall into a trap , generally also known as motivated reasoning. They think that to solve a big problem, they need a big, complex solution. They try to build a skyscraper without laying the foundation.
There is a rule in systems theory called Gall’s Law:
“A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. You have to start over with a working simple system.”
This is where most of us fail. We try to launch the perfect, complex version of ourselves, our product, or our business. We fail because we didn’t respect the phase of simplicity.
Simplicity is an Aggressive Strategy
Simplicity isn’t about being dumb. It’s about being effective.
In communication: If you can’t explain it to a 10-year-old, you don’t understand it well enough to scale it.
In habits: A 5-minute workout you actually do is infinitely better than the perfect 2-hour routine you skip.
In product: Google started as a white page with a single search bar. Yahoo was a complex directory of everything. We know who won.
The world is noisy. People are tired. They are desperate for clarity.
So, Being clear is a better way to go than being smart.