作者把beta比作邀请客人进家门，主张只在产品接近正式上线、几乎成型时才开放测试，通常在上线前一两周。
Jason Fried
November 29, 2025
There are plenty of opportunities to invite people to your product ahead of the formal launch. Alpha, beta, etc.
My preference is only right at the end. Typically a week or two before we go live. When the product is in the very last throes of beta, barely beta. Essentially v0.99.
At this stage we’re not really looking for deep fundamental feedback, although we’ll get some. We’re going with the version we’re launching, so it doesn’t really help to soak in second guessing.
The main advantage to letting people in a bit ahead of launch is mostly for basic hygiene. It forces you to clean up, tie up loose ends, get some lingering stuff right you’ve been sitting on until now.
It’s like inviting guests to your house for dinner. Hopefully you keep a fairly tidy house, but if you know guests are coming by, there’s just another level of cleaning and tidying and prep you tend to do. All those little messes you could live with become things you just don’t want other people to see, experience, or notice. So you take care of them.
Guests are forcing functions. They help you do those last few things you know you need to do, but didn’t until now.
It’s now.
-Jason
About Jason Fried
Hey! I'm Jason, the Co-Founder and CEO at 37signals, makers of Basecamp and HEY. Subscribe below to follow my thinking on business, design, product development, and whatever else is on my mind. Thanks for visiting, thanks for reading.