One of the corollaries to this is that if you are basing your decisions on analytics, you are probably under-representing people who block them, who often tend to be a non-representative subset of your users. I have seen multiple projects do things like stop supporting features that their analytics “showed nobody was using” but failed to realize that a significant portion of their (often technical and very vocal) use…
"Oh, and by the way, responding to these kinds of issues with “if you wanted your voice to be heard, you should have turned on analytics” is inexcusable." Authentic question: how would a business know this otherwise in an actionable and effective way?
"Oh, and by the way, responding to these kinds of issues with “if you wanted your voice to be heard, you should have turned on analytics” is inexcusable." Authentic question: how would a business know this otherwise in an actionable and effective way?
Just ask people!
How? In surveys? No one does those.
Plus, people often don't give valuable feedback when asked questions about features they want and use... people are poor judges of what they actually want, and will list things they think they care about and then end up never using or which don't affect their choices.
One of the corollaries to this is that if you are basing your decisions on analytics, you are probably under-representing people who block them, who often tend to be a non-representative subset of your users. I have seen multiple projects do things like stop supporting features that their analytics “showed nobody was using” but failed to realize that a significant portion of their (often technical and very vocal) use…
War story: we turned off the “print” button on MSN because it was unused. Users in Japan complained - they were printing articles to read on the train. Turned it back on in that geo
"Oh, and by the way, responding to these kinds of issues with “if you wanted your voice to be heard, you should have turned on analytics” is inexcusable." Authentic question: how would a business know this otherwise in an actionable and effective way?
"Oh, and by the way, responding to these kinds of issues with “if you wanted your voice to be heard, you should have turned on analytics” is inexcusable." Authentic question: how would a business know this otherwise in an actionable and effective way?
Just ask people!
I honestly think that a simple “we are considering removing feature X, please let us know if you’re still using this” can work extremely well. Everyone who cares about the feature will be sure to write in.
This is why I have analytics on the JavaScript side and server side. I can calculate those who block my analytics and at the same time capture a lot of the relevant information
One of the corollaries to this is that if you are basing your decisions on analytics, you are probably under-representing people who block them, who often tend to be a non-representative subset of your users. I have seen multiple projects do things like stop supporting features that their analytics “showed nobody was using” but failed to realize that a significant portion of their (often technical and very vocal) use…
When I turned off my Windows 10 Telemetry, I expressed a clear choice that I'd rather not give my data, and it's fine for my voice to not be heard. I just really don't care about Windows 10 that much. On the other hand, I turned on all the telemetry for OctoPi, Steam, and a bunch of other softwares I care about. I want my voice to be heard for those cases. Just curious, what's so inexcusable about that?
Because telemetry, by default, subverts consent of what I’d like to share: I may care about feature X and would like you to know I am using it, but I may not trust that you’re not also logging me when I do sensitive operation Y that I might not want to share (or even want to share with you that I used feature X at 10 PM on Friday). Perhaps it would be better if programs let you review telemetry data before you sent it, but I am unsure if anyone will actually do this or if people can meaningfully take the time to essentially review and opt out of things they don’t want to share.
One of the corollaries to this is that if you are basing your decisions on analytics, you are probably under-representing people who block them, who often tend to be a non-representative subset of your users. I have seen multiple projects do things like stop supporting features that their analytics “showed nobody was using” but failed to realize that a significant portion of their (often technical and very vocal) use…
War story: we turned off the “print” button on MSN because it was unused. Users in Japan complained - they were printing articles to read on the train. Turned it back on in that geo
Probably faxed them to their friends and family too. I sympathize - paper is really nice
This is why I have analytics on the JavaScript side and server side. I can calculate those who block my analytics and at the same time capture a lot of the relevant information
Subverting the desires of people who would like privacy is not a good look.