Obamacare's Health Insurance Websites, in Bumby Debut, Are Typical of Tech Launches - Businessweek

Sign of the times

"Washington still has a bit of time. Oliver Kharraz, one of the founders of health-care startup ZocDoc, argues that the insurance-exchange websites aren’t really the product being sold to Americans—it’s the idea of affordable health insurance and the legal incentives to buy some that are generating today’s Web traffic. Since people won’t be required to have coverage for several months hence, a few overwhelmed websites could be nothing more than an embarrassing blip so long as everything is up and running by December. If the websites can help insurance shoppers meet that deadline, the user experience doesn’t need to be Cupertino-level beautiful—just good enough to work.
The silver lining behind an awful first day could be that the bar is lowered, once people have something they can actually interact with. “Happiness,” says Kharraz, “equals reality minus expectations.”"

Obamacare's Health Insurance Websites, in Bumby Debut, Are Typical of Tech Launches - Businessweek