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The rise of user-hostile software

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Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#281

Post by hnick »

api wrote: post #53
TeMPOraL wrote: post #26

Agreed on all points. Interesting to see this: > You can argue that all of this has existed for a very long time, back from the days of all kinds of toolbars and extensions that created multiple levels of address bar nesting in your web browser and taskbar. What I find ironic about the whole situation is, back then it was universally known that those toolbars and extensions are distributed by assholes. The whole soft…

> Something weird happened over the past decade. I blame free (as in beer). If you can’t sell software you have to monetize in other ways. This creates a huge forcing function to push acceptance of surveillance, adware, and worse as hard as possible. It’s hard to complete with free. A free thing can build a network effect fast, then monetize with roundabout methods like surveillance. Payment also adds friction, and I…

A similar thing happened in games. I'm old enough to remember horse armour in Oblivion. Ridiculous idea but look where we are now. Not only do most microtransactions cost more, they aren't only in free to play games. They're in full price games and those with monthly subscriptions. And they have enough people arguing that it's a good thing because more money = better game.

I can buy a mount in a game for USD$40... or I could buy another game.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#282

Post by no_time »

GuB-42 wrote: post #204

I think it is correlated to the rise of free (as in $0) software. People don't like to pay and developers want to make money. So the strategy is to make the initial cost low, preferably zero, and then make the user pay, directly or indirectly. It is not new, we had things like shareware in the past, but now, developers have more options, and they use them, because the most "user-hostile" thing is to ask for money, es…

This argument falls apart if you look at windows. You are (supposed to) pay for it AND you get datamined until you are dry.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#283

Post by frankzinger »

admax88qqq wrote: post #271
donkarma wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electron is not native

It's more native than a web page. Is an app in C# not native? Or Lua? or Python?

No it is not. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_(computing):

"In computing, native software or data-formats are those that were designed to run on a particular operating system. In a more technical sense, native code is code written specifically for a certain processor.[1] In contrast, cross-platform software can be run on multiple operating systems and/or computer architectures."

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#284

Post by john61 »

joshuaissac wrote: post #206
thefr0g wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that with FLOSS you can fix both of these problems yourself.

That is not the case for any software that is not trivial. Recompiling to remove ads from a free program may be achievable but something like adding the missing support for Excel VBA into LibreOffice Calc is beyond the capability of almost all users.

You can also pay competent developers to add it: https://libreoffice.cib.de/ Even easier if almost all users unite in crowdfunding.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#285

Post by john61 »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #93
john61 wrote: post #70

Just use free software. Stallman was right.

Unfortunately: - A lot of free software either sucks or is entirely non-existent for many use cases - Free software is not entirely immune to this behavior either

I prefer to not use a feature instead of using a hostile one.

In my more than 20 years of journey in the free software world, I never came across a user hostile free software. This is in stark contrast to proprietary software I tried.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#286

Post by the_other »

noasaservice wrote: post #156
the_other wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a career front-end developer, I take affront at this. I have never argued in favour of any of the shit people face on the web on a daily basis. I’m close to wanting to get out of the industry because the product is so toxic these days. The people are largely great, I love my current team.. but every month we’re told to add more tracking, or advertising (from Google of all people). I could leave out of political di…

Dont take a critique of the job title as a slight against you personally. We, frankly, don't know you. And as a whole industry, front-end devs have implemented atrocious dark patterns and all manners of disgusting anti-user choices. Have you? Only you can answer that - but I sincerely don't care about your personal choices. This discussion was never aimed at "the_other".

Honestly, I knew that it wasn’t meant at me. But I am DEEPLY frustrated at the lack of power I have in these situations.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#287

Post by TeMPOraL »

jeegsy wrote: post #273
TeMPOraL wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Customers asked for it: Check. > Customers would benefit from it: Check. The key is in what the word "it" means. The answers are positive if by "it" you mean "this category of product". They may very well be negative if by "it" you mean "our particular product". The customers want a jar of salsa. They don't want, and never asked for, your particular variation of a jar of salsa, essentially identical to 10 other var…

Customers didnt ask for an iPad but they sure bought the hell out of it

They asked for PADD from Star Trek: The Next Generation, and iPad was the closest the market could give them.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#288

Post by selfhoster11 »

hakfoo wrote: post #272
selfhoster11 wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely. Payment processors gatekeeping the collection of small donations is soon to be a solved problem thanks to cryptocurrency. I mistrust anything that purports to enable something like this via centralised banking, primarily because it will let regulators of unrelated jurisdictions and large corporations/banks control and surveil the transactions. It's either crypto, or this.

I'm skeptical if the problem is technical about micropayments. Let's assume we have some hypothetical zero fee universal payment platform. You CAN send a developer 3 cents because you like his work. But now you've got the psychological barrier-- people don't want to think about spending 3 cents, even if they aren't bothered by the cost in the abstract. Then you need to make it a cultural norm-- that sending 3 cents i…

IMO, the lack of micro (and I mean micro on order of 3 cents, like you mentioned) payment platforms is what kept such tiny donations from being normalised. My theory is that it will become normalised in certain circles, now that it's technically possible.

Even if it's a very, very thin trickle of donations, I would still take it as evidence that someone appreciates my work enough to think "hey, I should really send some money this guy's way, he's helped me out with this software/blog post". Allowing transactions on the order of single cents mitigates the psychological barrier of making some donation at all to the highest extent possible.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#289

Post by selfhoster11 »

admax88qqq wrote: post #271
donkarma wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electron is not native

It's more native than a web page. Is an app in C# not native? Or Lua? or Python?

If it runs in a DOM, it's not native. Native (to me) means it uses a layout engine that's significantly different from a web browser, uses native controls relentlessly, and integrates well with the OS. Electron cannot do that. QT, C#, Lua and Python can.

Re: The rise of user-hostile software

#290

Post by Ekaros »

EamonnMR wrote: post #168
zelon88 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which means the rise of Linux desktop or Fediverse platforms, and that's gonna be a while, but not impossible. I like to hope you're right, but I don't believe you are. Most people don't want to learn more about tech. They just want tech to be intuitive enough to pick up and use. The mobile market appeared because Windows is too big and cumbersome. That's why people advertised it as a skill on their resume. It isn'…

The reason you don't list android user on your resume is that it's very difficult to use android (or iOS) for anything beyond passive consumption of content which is not something employers want.

Also I think Windows/Office is kinda left-over from 20-30 years back when it wasn't fully standard knowledge... So it's entirely meaningless buzzword used to fill up CVs...
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