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Why "Everyone's Using It" Is Never A Reason To Use Anything
By Nigel Guy · 2 min read
"Everyone's using it" is how a lot of AI tools get adopted. A colleague
mentions it, your feed is full of it, a client asks if you've tried it,
and suddenly not using it feels like a gap. So you sign up, poke at it,
and either keep paying out of vague obligation or drop it without learning
anything. Popularity did the deciding, and your actual needs never got a
say.
The rule: popularity tells you a tool is worth a look, never that it's
worth using — so turn "everyone's using it" into a specific question about
your own work before it gets a place in your workflow.
Why popularity misleads
- "Everyone" is usually your feed. What looks universal is often a
particular group of people who post a lot about tools. Many people
quietly use something else, or nothing.
- Popular for what? A tool can be widely used for one thing and poor
at another. Its reputation rarely comes with that breakdown.
- Adoption isn't satisfaction. Sign-ups and mentions don't show how
many people kept using it, or how many are using it out of habit rather
than choice.
- Popularity compounds itself. People mention what others mention.
Visibility becomes the reason for more visibility, independent of
quality.
The Popularity Translation
When you hear "everyone's using it," translate it into three questions
you can answer:
| Instead of |
Ask |
| "Everyone's using it" |
"Which specific task would I use it for?" |
| "It's the best tool" |
"Better than what I use now, on that task, by how much?" |
| "I should keep up" |
"What would I stop doing, or do differently, if I adopted it?" |
If you can't name a task, there's nothing to test yet. If you can, run
that task through the tool alongside your current approach and compare
the results directly.
The few times popularity does matter
Popularity isn't completely irrelevant. It can be a genuine factor when:
- You need to collaborate and shared tooling reduces friction with
colleagues or clients.
- You want a large support base — more tutorials, more answered
questions, more integrations.
- Longevity matters and wide use makes a tool somewhat less likely to
vanish.
Even then, these are reasons to include a tool in your test, not reasons
to skip testing.
What to skip
- Skip the fear of missing out. A tool you don't need doesn't become
useful because others use it.
- Skip joining just to be able to talk about it. Reading one honest
review gets you the conversational version without the subscription.
- Skip treating non-adoption as a position you must defend. "It didn't
fit my work" is a complete answer.
Guardrails
- Apply the same logic in reverse: "nobody uses it" isn't a reason to rule
something out if it fits your task well.
- Workplace tools are different. If your organisation has standardised on
something, there may be good reasons — security, compliance, support —
that outweigh personal preference.
- Your own test on your own task remains the most reliable signal. Popular
opinion, including this library's, comes second to that.
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