I'm constantly amazed by how incremental people are in creating webapps. The long tail is an interesting concept but why is the digg/reddit concept for a specific niche being so thoroughly flogged to death? Is each site really grabbing big enough traffic numbers to make it a worthwhile pursuit?
How can we break ourselves of the herd and copy+features methods of problem solving?
I don't think this was supposed to be a feat of engineering. They're trying to create a site for a specific niche, seemingly targetting 25 to 45 year old design professionals. This is a bit like asking why are there so many vBulletin forums out there.
and I think either one is a valid question. what I meant was I wish there was at least some differentiation between stuff not just simple rehashing for different audiences, oh well.
I generally agree with your point but in this specific case - design float is actually a very useful site for those of us looking to brush up on web design tips.
How can we break ourselves of the herd and copy+features methods of problem solving?