Live data from Hacker News

Users hate change

gist.github.com

221–230 of 315 posts

Re: Users hate change

#221
post #8

This is just curmudgeonliness backed by nothing at all. You probably shouldn't do major redesigns with no real benefit to the user (I'm looking at you, reddit), but if you're adding or improving functionality, then feel free to incrementally improve your site constantly. People will get used to constant small improvements and will miss them if they stop. Users don't hate change, they hate arbitrary change that forces…

"Users don't hate change, they hate arbitrary change that forces them to learn how to use your site again, or that removes features they enjoy." How does this square with the overwhelmingly negative early responses to facebook's news feed, or reactions? Would you characterize them as "arbitrary"? I use those as examples because they now seem widely loved, so they seem like good (non-arbitrary) design to me, but they…

Is the facebook news feed actually widely loved now? I only hear yearning for the old chrono feed

Re: Users hate change

#222
This is wildly dependent on your original design actually being good.

Many products are NOT good at first and constantly redesign until they get something good. It's silly to give blanket advice "never redesign your product."

Re: Users hate change

#223
post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not buy this. You're equating security updates with UI changes. Pointless UI changes get a lot more frustrating as you get older. What we really need is software with really long support versions that minimize bullshit churn in UI and usability.

Old version support has a cost for the company supporting it. I guess it shows to the maturity of the company when they do. It's not easy to pull off. As a dev on a mid-size project, I'd say that those UI changes often have two sides, with people who will also complain "why can't you just fix/change X, it's such a small change, but so annoying". Everyone wants their issue fixed, but not the issues of others. Our proj…

> Old version support has a cost for the company supporting it.

Old UI support has zero cost to it.

Arbitrary new UIs have significant cost to them.

Re: Users hate change

#224
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was feasible in a world where every computer was air-gapped because there was no such thing as the Internet. Now every app needs to stay up to date for security reasons, even if it doesn't directly use the internet itself.

What types of security vulnerabilities could apps like LibreOffice or Photoshop have?

https://www.securityfocus.com/bid/109374 just recently.

Re: Users hate change

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a big difference between offering "end-of-life" versions for download, even if they are no longer supported, and forcing users on new versions even if they don't want to (which is fairly common for mobile/web apps and generally subscription-models like Adobe and Autodesk switched to).

That's because the world decided to adopt software as a service model, where your device is just a thin client and real work is happening on a server. And that model is incompatible with letting customers to run old versions.

Sure if you by "world" you mean bean counters and not users.

Re: Users hate change

#226
The hardest part in software development is probably to not add new features. Learned the hard way. (The things users tell you they want, is rarely what they actually want.)

Re: Users hate change

#227
post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It worked well for a while. […] And with App Stores basically stealing 30% of all your sales … I’ve never understood that argument. Physical media production, packaging and shelf space was way more expensive than 30%. Not trying to justify the Apple’s Premium here, just pointing out that it’s a lot cheaper than physical retail used to be. > I kept using Photoshop because its just a better software... In some ways i…

Well, I could sell it on my website and keep 100% of the sales? Modern operating systems seem to think any binary is malware these days. Windows ads a NTFS metadata tag to any file thats downloaded online and will throw up scary looking warnings when you try to run it. And the security folks spent years writing columns telling people not to download "random" binaries from the internet. So now we download "random" bin…

Maybe I the buyer am willing to pay 150% in the store compared to on your website. I need to find my credit card, to trust one more random website with it... I have certainly decided not to buy things for this reason. And if I don't know too much about you, then I'll take all the sandboxing I can get, and happily pay a premium for that too.

And of course you only get 100% if you have zero fraud, zero hassles, no fees, no awkward cases.

Re: Users hate change

#228
Wow this person is projecting their ignorance of the decades of academic HCI studies and industry best practices, including UX design and research methodologies for bringing the user into the design process (to understand their needs) and uncovering user insights from testing designs early on in the design process. Would love to see some concrete examples of redesigns that support the author's argument because I can provide plenty that prove the opposite which simplified user flows and introduced better conceptual models/interaction design patterns that were vetted through user testing.

Maybe they've only worked with smaller teams or visual/graphic designers. Any large organization with a competent UX team can easily dismiss a majority of their claims by exposing them to the UX design process.

"Every change that you make to the product after I have bought it makes it more likely that I will leave your product and find something else that does X instead, because the cost to me to learn how to something different in your product is now not much different than the cost to learn how to do something in a different product."

Product redesigns should optimize and make product features more efficient/simple to use for the core audience (user personas [1]) and support their experience in achieving their end goals (journey mapping [2]).

(Downvoters- would love to hear your perspective)

1. https://www.nngroup.com/videos/personas/

2. https://www.nngroup.com/articles/customer-journey-mapping/

Re: Users hate change

#229
Guess what. Programmeurs hate change directer by others too. Otherwise we’d all be working in the “perfect” language, and all this legacy wouldnt be be here. It’s simply an egoistic/arrogant point of view of “the designer”, which can be a programmer, pm, visual designer, ceo, anyone really, who thinks he’s better and smarter than the rest, and thinks he holds the perfect solution. Sometimes this turns out right. Often it doesnt

Re: Users hate change

#230
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Subscription model is actually way better if you don't want to end up with feature bloat. Because you actually get money from users even if you only ever fix bugs and improve performance. If you freeze your features you will soon arrive at a point where everybody who wanted your software bought it and then the revenue stops.

"everybody who wanted your software bought it and then the revenue stops." That's... how it should work. You don't get to hook into their wallets for time and all eternity. everybody who wanted your bought it and then the revenue stops. everybody who wanted your bought it and then the revenue stops. everybody who wanted your bought it and then the revenue stops. ... and then you go do something else! That is the prec…

how am I supposed to make a living if I can't charge rent?
Post reply on HN