We transferred an idea from engineering to culture, but it’s incomplete.
If you build a watch that doesn’t tell time, it’s fair to say it doesn’t work.
But when a critic says, “that joke didn’t work,” after seeing a comic perform to a raucous audience, what they probably mean is, “that didn’t work for me.”
The problem might not be the comic. It might be the critic.
“It’s not for you,” is a useful, almost essential way to navigate the creation of our cultural work. If you say it too often to the people you were seeking to serve, your work needs improvement. But when you say it to a critic you never intended to please, you’re opening the door to serving the people you do care about.