Computers Hate Us Now, Because Capitalism

These were the days! (Yes, I realize that’s code, not manuals. Pretend they are manuals.) Source.

So, computers kind of hate us these days. Well, hate is too strong a word. And it’s not actually the computer’s fault. So, I guess–

“Ian you’re doing that thing where you ramble instead of actually starting to talk about the topic.”

Right. So, recently a fellow by the name of @ajroach42 went on an interesting jag on Mastodon. They later turned it into a blog post, which you can view at http://ajroach42.com/observations-on-modern-computing-the-last-10-years-were-a-misstep/. The tl;dr version: computers are now less and less about empowering the user. Many things have gotten easier, but at the cost of only being able to do them a very certain way, and not understanding the underlying mechanisms by which they do them. Users are no longer empowered to learn and grow. Instead they have to follow the nice little track a given company (Facebook, Microsoft, etc) have dug for them, or their computer will simply not work to do what they need.

(Seriously though, please go read it, in spite of my tl;dr version. It’s well worth your time.)

One thing the post mentions that really struck home with me is about how we don’t get proper manuals with anything anymore. Sure, getting a three-ring-bound brick of documentation to go along with a new computer or a new program was intimidating. But the trick of it was, once you started using it, it wasn’t actually that intimidating! Instead, it was a thorough reference document that let you troubleshoot your own issues, figure out how to do things yourself, and make your own way in the computing world. We don’t have that now. Instead we have Windows installations where privacy-invading settings are turned on by default and the option to change them is downplayed or obscured; programs that are all subscription-based and only run on the company’s server, so we can’t possibly alter them or use them differently; incomplete tutorials that barely teach us how to use the software at all, much less how to get the most out of it, or really dig into the meat of what it can do. Users that want to really learn how to use something have been relegated to digging through forum posts and old blogs, hoping someone else found some hack-y way to do the thing they need a program to do, because the program doesn’t give them the tools to fix the workflow/functionality thmeselves.

Now, not everyone needs to be able to get down to brass tacks with every piece of software they own. I get that. But that we’re being denied the option more and more is incredibly frustrating. Every piece of software is getting streamlined within an inch of its life, obscuring or removing functionality to be “simpler.” Even when that simplicity means you can no longer get the software to do what you need it to do, to do something it should be perfectly capable of. Someday, no matter how much you love how simple something is, you’re going to have a need that the lowest-common-denominator use case doesn’t account for, and there’ll be no way to do it. Or maybe there is, but it’s hidden behind an icon that the developers assumed had universal meaning but that you personally have never seen before in your life.

I miss users being empowered. I miss the feeling that even if I busted something on my computer, with work and patience I could probably fix it again on my own. I don’t want us to be at the mercy of a company’s support (or lack of it) and goodwill. I want us to be able to be responsible for our own computing experience, and encouraged to build something to make that experience better. Maybe even share what we build.

But if we did that too much, we’d break our reliance, our dependence, on the companies, and they very much don’t want us to do that.

It’s a shame for them that I, at least, am going to keep trying to do it anyway. I hope you will, too. Let’s take back our tools so we can use them to their full potential. And if the company doesn’t want us to? Then we should switch to another company.