Rolling snowballs!

by on March 4, 2006

When Doc Searls says he does blogging to roll snowballs down the hill I totally understand that.

When geeks attack me saying “he’s just a user and isn’t technical” I should take that as a compliment.

Damn straight I’m a user. And, I want better software. That’s why I praise developers who do cool stuff. I find that that brings better results than any other technique I’ve found so far.

Pay the developers with love. Roll a snowball down the hill.

Found any new software that you love? Praise it!

Here’s a hint to developers: if you treat users with disdain, maybe that’s being reflected in your software! I think that’s the point Dave Winer is trying to make when he’s talking about the language geeks use to describe users.

I’m guilty of saying what Dave is talking about, by the way. We need better personas to talk about different kinds of people who use computers.

By the way, Doc, I still read your blog every day and have done so for more than five years now. Thanks for being such an inspiration to me and sharing so much of your life with me.

  • Diego Barros
    I completely agree. I've seen lots of dodgy software where the greatness stopped at the code. It was not reflected through the product, especially not to the user experience.

    I've seen some very dodgy and unusable software over the years because not enough care was taken to take note of how someone would actually go about using the software. Either the UI is bad or the workflow makes you jump through numerous hoops. This being as a result of some people being techies and not able to see things from a user's point of view. Whether it be because of disdain or not being a good developer.

    Making something simple and intuitive is a difficult thing. But it is something that should be pursued. One way is by talking to your users.
  • Matt
    Good lord, Scoble, how disingenous can you get? Apparently you've forgotten that people weren't slagging you for not being technical, they were slagging you because you were *giving technical explanations* that made no sense and *critizing technical decisions* and that you clearly didn't understand. God!
  • Regardless of whether people like you or not, the main point is clear. Design for your end user. You folks can have the 'my balls are bigger than yours' conversation all day, but you need something your end users will use. That's how google became the leading search engine over yahoo.
  • J. Random Poster
    Oh, that's priceless! An employee of the Evil Empire wants better software? Try going postal and taking out 70% of the managers at Microsoft. It might be a good start. ;-)
  • Robert, the refrain of “he’s just a user and isn’t technical” is precisely the problem with self-described geeks and techno-elite. As someone who has been on the R&D side for years I think I can say that with reasonable accuracy.

    The end-user and original goal often get lost in the development process.

    Ultimately, software is a tool to solve a problem. If you're not solving the problem, or if you're making it difficult to do so, then what's the point in the whole exercise? A competitor will come along with a better design that causes customers less pain and your product dies.

    Talk to the users of your product. Talk to the users of your competitors' products. Find out what works, what doesn't and what they need. Then go and build it.

    Given the choice of two comparable products, why would anyone choose the one with a poor user experience and bad design?
  • anon
    Ah, the old attack on developers/engineers/IT because "I'm just a poor little user and want to use Microsoft Office monopoly software and stay in blissful ignorance." OK, that last part was snarky.

    Remember, when users are in trouble with software developers/engineers/IT come to help, not Microsoft. And we can help a lot more when the software is written in transparency and the documents are in OPEN FORMATS.
  • Doug
    Talking of the language Geeks use, I think "before all the newbies arrived" has to be a classic, and I love the irony that quote comes from Daves site. Respect should be global and perpetual, not aimed at particular audiences when it feels appropriate.

    Incidentally, should the MSN Alerts link be updated to your Wordpress blog? "Be the first to comment" and this is #7
  • I recently found a neat utility not through a blog, but through a screenshot posted to flickr! WinDirStat gives a graphical representation of your hard drive, color-coding the different types of file and sorting them by size.
  • J. Random: that doesn't work. Why? Cause they'll be replaced.

    I find it's far more useful to help lead them to the promised land. I find honey works a lot better than vile. You just provided the vile. Let me know how well that works with your management.
  • >>“he’s just a user and isn’t technical” I should take >> that as a compliment.

    You bet your naked conversation you should.
    It's all relative anyway. Some would say I'm one of the geekiest tech guys in ... Oregon ... but feel like an "uninformed newbie" when I talk to the Silicon Valley dot com wonder boys.

    Anyway, we are all in this together and you've reflected that in your blog for years - good show Scoble!
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