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A few years ago I worked as a journalist, and one of the major events at the time was news photographers hating the fact that newspapers were sending out normal
by microcentury 17y ago
A few years ago I worked as a journalist, and one of the major events at the time was news photographers hating the fact that newspapers were sending out normal reporters with DSLRs and telling them to take 200+ shots. Most of the time, they took a usable photograph. The pro news photographers said, 'But you can't expect an untrained person to take good photographs!' And they insisted that the papers stop sending out camera-armed news reporters.
The thing with that, though, was that if you John Random Reporter couldn't take pictures of near-equivalent quality to a John Pro Photographer, the papers would stop doing it. But they didn't. If the photographers' point was true, they had nothing to worry about. But they knew they did indeed have something to worry about. The truth was that the amateurs could come close enough to equalling the pros that the trade off versus cost savings was worth it.
There is a parallel here with closed versus open systems. We howl, 'You can't do that!! Closed systems canot possibly equal the innovation and development of open!!' And if that's the case, we have nothing to worry about. Quite possibly, though, that is not the case. The insistence on closed that seems so anathema to much of the history of software development may in fact be a good thing for the end user, and our howls of outrage nothing more than being called on something that is no longer true.
That sense of threat would at least explain the inordinate number of HN stories on this topic.
- Legion 17y agoThe problem with this is that the erosion of quality is not necessarily noticed immediately, but the slow increase of dissatisfaction builds until people finally reach the quitting point. There's many instances of media where I look at older versions of the product and think, "man, why is this quality absent from their product today?". I didn't consciously notice it when the snowball was still near the top of the mountain. But eventually the snowball got big enough for me to bail.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- jasonlotito 17y agoI know it's not your point, but something you said got me thinking about something else. "Closed systems canot possibly equal the innovation and development of open!!'" I always look at the internet as proof that an open system that was successful because it was open. The same with email. Both of these systems was more successful than anything Apple could every do. In the world of closed v.s. open, closed is generations behind in the innovation and success department.
- cturner 17y agoThe insistence on closed that seems so anathema to much of the history of software development may in fact be a good thing for the end user Users are happy right now, but the time line of returns is significant. People will be unhappy about losing their music, or when they can't get important apps upgraded. Closed systems generally aim to give you a capability quickly, but lock you in as they do. Open systems are often a dog to get working, but once you do you find the capability continues to pay dividends. - Visual basic lets you create apps quickly but there's a lot of things you can't do, and your platform might be taken away from you. - Microsoft word allows anyone to create small, well-formatted document with low training. But there's tooling lock-in, it's unwieldy to have many people work on documents, it's hard to transform your data. - Iphone lets you get easy access to music and apps. But they won't transfer forever; long-term upgrade options are even more complicated than in consulting software because Apple would need to participate in maintenance. Something we've seen with open platforms is that they move slowly but rarely lose ground. The PC architecture and unix are examples.