Let's say it's Friday night and you want to mix a cocktail, a cool Cucumber Cooler.

Here's what you need:

• Cucumber
• Sugar
• Gin
• Mint
• Lime
• Tonic water

If you don't have the ingredients, you'll have to get them before even making the recipe. They are prerequisites. Preconditions. Requirements.

This is a barrier to entry.

It's already 9pm on a Friday night one drink in, and now you're in the mood for gin.

You aren't going to drive to the store.

You do have tonic water and gin, though.

So you make a G and T instead, it'll do the job. Your friends are waiting.

When a piece of software has a prerequisite to get started, and we can't easily configure, install, understand, or get it running as we try to learn, that's when we usually demur (and maybe never come back, if there are alternatives with fewer prerequisites).

When you create content, are you thinking about what prerequisites are needed for someone to even begin to learn your product?

The prerequisites are friction to the learning experience, and consequently, adoption.

If you aren't considering how to lower it, there are people in your audience who are missing out on the pleasure of enjoying your product's cool, refreshing cucumber taste today (or ever).

Have a lovely day,
Kamran