the.com/viability
The line between 'theoretically possible' and 'please stop trying.'
means The capacity of something — a plan, a business, an organism — to actually survive and function rather than just sound good on paper.
from Traces back to French 'viable,' built from 'vie' (life), itself from Latin 'vita.' The word first clustered around literal survival — an infant or organism capable of living independently — before business and policy language stretched it to cover plans, markets, and ideas that might likewise live or quietly die.
- startup usage
- means you have 18 months before the money finds out
- biology term
- originally about whether something can survive outside the womb
- favorite dodge
- lets investors say no without saying your idea is bad
- false friend
- viable is not the same as good, just not dead yet