This is pretty obvious and, by definition, is what most people already do, but we’ve found the concept handle useful. When we notice one of our concept handles has stuck, it’s handy to have a blog post to link to that defines it.
In this case, it’s a strategy for minimizing software headaches. Namely, to delay software upgrades (not counting security updates — always do those) long enough that you’re always on whatever version the majority of people are on. Safety in numbers! I use the heuristic of always being one version behind whatever the very latest is. Like for macOS, my laptop wants me to upgrade to Tahoe but I’m staying put on Sequoia. Until I hear about whatever Tahoe’s successor is. Then I’ll finally upgrade to Tahoe.
Maybe I’m being a bit extreme on that one. My friend Serine Molecule suggests a tempered sheeple strategy of merely waiting to upgrade to the next major macOS version until it gets its first point release. And of course a fully strict sheeple strategy would be to always upgrade to whatever has the most market share:
Of course if everyone followed the sheeple strategy we’d have zero progress ever. So the more pro-social version is to diligently upgrade at least to the majority version and bonus points for taking one for the team sometimes and braving the bleeding edge. And realistically there are enough people doing that because they’re compelled to (as I sometimes am myself). So you can consider yourself to have done your part by following the most sheeply version of the sheeple strategy. At least you’re not a straggler.
Generalizations
If you’re a web developer you probably know about “Can I Use”. A prudent sheeple strategy is to use a fancy JavaScript feature when something like 90% of browsers in the wild support it. (The other half of the sheeple strategy here, as an end user, is to expect developers to do that and make sure you’re in that 90%.)
And to go weirdly far afield, there’s a classic Scott Alexander post I’m enamored with that advocates a sheeple strategy for language usage: “Give Up Seventy Percent Of The Way Through The Hyperstitious Slur Cascade”.
One more example, back in the realm of tech: The last time we had multiple hours of downtime (see status.beeminder.com for gory details) was due to a huge data center outside of New York City having some kind of meltdown. It’s plenty embarrassing that we’re not robust to such things but being located in a popular data center of a popular cloud provider is another sheeple strategy. In this case it had the advantage that enough of the rest of the internet was down that our users treated it as an act of God and, I guess, blamed us less. Again, not something to be proud of, exactly, but what did you expect with a name like “sheeple strategy”? Still, it is sometimes the unironically savvy strategy. And now you know what to call it, you’re welcome.
Related Concepts
- Clive Freeman used to call this a fast follower strategy, which is a business term for the counterpart of the first mover. See “Second-mover advantage”.
- Theo Spears points out the idea of innovation tokens, from the classic Dan McKinley essay “Choose Boring Technology”.
- Also via Theo Spears, the technology adoption life cycle as popularized in Crossing the Chasm.