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98% isn't much

whynothugo.nl

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Re: 98% isn't much

#71

Post by Aachen »

Reminds me of statistic where most customers already stop going to a particular supermarket if it stops carrying a handful of the items they want to buy

It may sound like a small deal to not carry one brand of chocolate paste but if some customers then also don't buy the 12 other groceries they need at your shop, it doesn't really matter that it's only 2% of products that were discontinued. Supermarket products are so stable not because nobody ever makes anything new but because changing a small percentage frustrates customers

If I can't order from some website, I stop trying. Maybe next week the ESR browser gets an update and it works again but by then I'm not clicking those links in the search results

Re: 98% isn't much

#72

Post by londons_explore »

bradleybuda wrote: post #42
zero-sharp wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like how you equate 10 year old browser users with luddites?

It’s very difficult for the average person to use a ten year old browser; in fact I’d offer that the only way to use a ten year old browser is to be an expert and do so intentionally.

There are plenty of people with old android phones with no free disk space using ancient browsers.

There are plenty of people still using windows 10 with updates turned off or wedged for whatever reason.

These people just use the sites that work. They aren't computer experts, and might not even realise why half the internet doesn't work - they just think that's the way things are.

Re: 98% isn't much

#73

Post by ngriffiths »

wccrawford wrote: post #25

Alternatively, 98% is plenty . If your business plan requires you to capitalize on more than 98% of the market, it's already a failure. It'll never happen. As always, it's an "it depends" situation. If your userbase is largely luddites, then maybe you need to support 10+ year old browsers that can't be updated. Otherwise, you can probably just worry about people who are using computers new enough to actually update t…

It's also super easy to apply it wrong because going above X% in one area normally means sinking below X% in another. I think a clearer way to say it is that sometimes, you have to be almost perfect, and 98% could sound like almost perfect but it's way too low. But definitely the things you don't need to be perfect far outnumber the ones you do.

Re: 98% isn't much

#74

Post by mananaysiempre »

bradleybuda wrote: post #42
zero-sharp wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like how you equate 10 year old browser users with luddites?

It’s very difficult for the average person to use a ten year old browser; in fact I’d offer that the only way to use a ten year old browser is to be an expert and do so intentionally.

There’s also being poor, or working for an organization that’s poor. In both cases the obsolete(?) software might be various degrees of intentional, but the alternative is usually worse anyway.

Re: 98% isn't much

#75

Post by hadi121 »

I like to think it depends on what the actual topic is. Even the article's examples reinforce this.

98% market share? Amazing. 98% browser support? There are 15 billion screens in the world. 2% of that is 300 million. Hardly a number we can ignore. Edge cases for those 2% should be considered and implemented

Re: 98% isn't much

#76

Post by miltonlost »

wccrawford wrote: post #25

Alternatively, 98% is plenty . If your business plan requires you to capitalize on more than 98% of the market, it's already a failure. It'll never happen. As always, it's an "it depends" situation. If your userbase is largely luddites, then maybe you need to support 10+ year old browsers that can't be updated. Otherwise, you can probably just worry about people who are using computers new enough to actually update t…

Yes, the article discusses how 98% is good in context and bad in others. You just... restated the article but reversed the premise, resulting in an overly optimistic yet anti-social framing.

Re: 98% isn't much

#77

Post by adverbly »

Software isn't the product though.

Just like the article says, it depends on if the product is an essential or a dessert.

If your product is a "essential necessity" one, then 98% is terrible for your software.

If your product is a "dessert", then for it's software 98% is awesome.

Re: 98% isn't much

#78

Post by xdertz »

Panzerschrek wrote: post #62

There are cases when providing service for remaining 2% isn't profitable. It's better just say "sorry". I used to work in company where we have spent a lot of time making custom fixes for our software in order to work-around wired hardware/software bugs on machines of individual customers. Yes, we provided service for remaining 2% or so, but in cost of slowing-down overall product development and not making our produ…

So how about also getting rid of all regulations for wheelchair friendly infrastructure while we are at it? Way too expensive and it is even less than 2% of the population that requires it.

Re: 98% isn't much

#79

Post by londons_explore »

In today's world of AI it's fairly easy to make your site compatible with every version of internet explorer ever.

Just tell the AI to do it. It'll find a way. The maintenance burden for you will be minimal because the AI can keep the legacy compatibility bits in sync.

Re: 98% isn't much

#80

Post by EugeneOZ »

If for 2% of users a webpage will not look as awesome as intended (it's not guaranteed that it will be broken), that's ok. It's not poisoning - it's a 98% chance of getting a top mark.
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