I have never heard of uber, just like you
Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
61–70 of 194 posts
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#62There was a case more than 20 years ago of a similar revolt against a Canadian hospital's automated drug dispensing machine that would only let nurses withdraw the exact dose of medicine a patient needed in a short window around when patient was supposed to take each dose. It was so bad it got written up into an academic article: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/016224390202700...
> they resented features that controlled their time and their autonomy
Of course. Nobody likes being controlled by software. The computer is supposed to obey us, not the other way around. Software controlling humans is a violation of basic human dignity.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#63All the big tech company HQs regularly have protestors for random issues, some software-related.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#64Not actual physical mobilization but when the amount of mistreatment the team (and founder) behind Roam Research became too much, users started switching en masse and very vocally.
It was a lot of drama, I don't think I've ever seen a promising start-up blow the lead in this way. All because the founder thought himself to be the next Steve Jobs and thought that he had a defensible moat (spoiler alert: he didn't) so he could treat his users however he liked and charge them for five year plans without offering a road map.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#65Same software, different country: https://fi.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apotti_(potilastietoj%C3%A4r... It's been a very expensive disaster on the taxpayers' dime. Similar problems in UK and Denmark (links in Wikipedia).
This reminds me of the Monorail chapter in the Simpsons...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#66I've not seen anything as extreme as people in the streets, but regularly have seen employee pushback about erp system implementations, e.g. SAP. These enterprise systems are are all on the back of employees, by which I mean they are forced to take the extra time to use them while they are extremely unfriendly to the user - because they are bought by execs, and their value is not at all apparent to those who use then…
The software primarily serves its real customers, the executives who subject others to using the software. Seems like every field is taken over by these annoying products nowadays, which basically try to eliminate some employees and distribute the work to other employees (of course the software claims to mostly eliminate the work). As for the 15-minute logging requirement, that may actually be part of it, cynically.…
Also compliance. Some other company implements every regulation that gets dreamed up.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#67> an adaptation of Epic to the Norwegian Health system
> How bad can something be that users go out in the street to demostrate?
I'd have to know more about Epic to judge but I'd like to note that these hospital systems can have a major impact on productivity and how much money you make per hour. These systems are usually really bad, they are usually purchased by hospital staff that doesn't have to use the software.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#68An excerpt (hopefully apropos) from Digital Vegan
"Computing choices create real power relationships and enable invisible abuse, by exclusion or marginalisation. Computing choices probably have a far more profound effect on peoples' lives and practices than their choice of friends, religious affiliations or sexual preferences. Roughly, according to the American Time Use Survey and the 2014 Pew Research Social Networking Fact Sheet, we spend on average, 0.5 hours a day in prayer and group worship, 0.5 hours engaged in social and conversational activities, 0.35 hours in romantic and sexual activity and 8.0 hours of screen time, of which 3.0 hours is interactive [Pew14]. This places computing, and the choices of operating system, applications, and workflows right at the centre of a Western adult's life."
Street protests over software does seem a tad odd. But as power concentrates in the hands of ever fewer digital oligarchs I expect we'll see all sorts of push-back against effective mandates and life-patterns foisted upon populations by unelected power.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#69Secondary to the question, but I live right by the Epic campus and use the Epic MyChart platform to communicate with the University of Wisconsin health system. It is phenomenal as a patient; I can handle all billing, message any doctor I've seen, view test results as soon as they're uploaded, etc. Recently I saw the results of some bloodwork in the ER before the nurses had time to come and tell me about it. (The UI/U…
>message any doctor I've seen Doctors especially hate this part, since they don't get reimbursed for fielding these messages and (unlike scheduled appointments) there's no limit to how many there can be or how quickly they can come.
Yeah. These messaging services essentially place doctors on call at zero extra compensation.
Re: Ask HN: Have you ever heard of users demonstrating against software?
#70Old school RuneScape is an mmorpg where each game update goes to a vote, and if it doesn’t get 75% approval the updates are not worked on by devs and don’t get released. The community feels a strong ownership and connection over the game. So much so that when the development company (Jagex) makes a wrong decision, it’s common for users to “riot” in game. They go to a specific world, at a specific town, place down spe…
Usually I hear bad things about Jagex, I’m surprised they have a system in OSR where they don’t make changes without user approval