Lots of projects focus on an MVP, a minimum viable product: the least effort that it takes to make something that someone will pay for. The idea is that you can use that as a base to incrementally improve the product into something that people will actually recommend to each other, and perhaps from there get to a product that everybody wants.

I would like to suggest a different goal: the minimum awesome product. An MAP has one feature which makes it awesome, and everything else about it is the least that can be done without actively scaring away potential buyers. An MAP at the smallest price that makes a profit is better than an MVP, because users will recognize the great feature and be willing to take a chance on the rest.

The biggest problem with the MAP proposal is that it’s hard to recognize the difference between an awesome feature and one which just makes the creator happy. The second biggest problem is probably featuritis: once you make something awesome in one respect, how can you possibly bring yourself to do any less on the rest of it?