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This argument makes no sense?

Noseshine 10y ago
When I interpret it I see it as a valid point: When it's not one person or group doing it but the responsibility is widely distributed in space (many people in many places) and time (evolving complexity) we tend to just accept things as "that's just how it is" and not even try to challenge it. Which of course has a practical aspect, since it is about the hardest thing of all to try to change this kind of stuff. For example, when I compare my Atari 1040 STFM and what I could do with it with the progress in hardware and software and what I can do now I can only conclude that hardware and software advances greatly outpaced the actual "customer-facing" abilities of the system. Sure I can do much - much - more now, I'm talking about scale comparison. So all those much-greater-scale advances disappear somewhere between the internals of the system and what the user gets in the end. But saying exactly where or even changing it would be an incredibly challenge, and given the continuously changing landscape practically impossible. Not sure how that applies in this context, "overengineering" after all is exactly not what I describe since that's a word meant to used for a deliberate design process, but that's my thoughts for the above comment and the issue raised by the OP comment about page size and complexity on Medium.
logicallee 10y ago
The argument makes perfect sense. Nobody can use the theoretical swiss army knife pictured in the article - it's too wide, and ridiculous. In the graphicon of over-engineering taking over users and enveloping them, pushing design out of the way, it implies that the result is hostile to users, and pushes design out of the way. But where we read this is an example of the person selecting the "knife" in question out of every single blogging platform on the planet. So, the swiss army knife pictured is inaccurate, it's a straw man. Secondly, the author clearly finds the design appropriate enough to use, and a great match for their user stories. So whereas the central thesis in the article says: > "small, elegant, and successful systems tend to be plagued with feature creep due to inflated expectations". The author is not using a "small, elegant, succcessful system". Perhaps the swiss army knife pictured is the best knife on the planet, and not one of the worst. This fundamentally undercuts the point the author is making.
- markcerqueira 10y ago
  I believe the comment I was replying to was saying one should not use Medium because it is an "over-engineered blogging platform." I was not arguing for creating or using theoretical swiss army knifes.

When I interpret it I see it as a valid point: When it's not one person or group doing it but the responsibility is widely distributed in space (many people in many places) and time (evolving complexity) we tend to just accept things as "that's just how it is" and not even try to challenge it. Which of course has a practical aspect, since it is about the hardest thing of all to try to change this kind of stuff. For example, when I compare my Atari 1040 STFM and what I could do with it with the progress in hardware and software and what I can do now I can only conclude that hardware and software advances greatly outpaced the actual "customer-facing" abilities of the system. Sure I can do much - much - more now, I'm talking about scale comparison. So all those much-greater-scale advances disappear somewhere between the internals of the system and what the user gets in the end. But saying exactly where or even changing it would be an incredibly challenge, and given the continuously changing landscape practically impossible. Not sure how that applies in this context, "overengineering" after all is exactly not what I describe since that's a word meant to used for a deliberate design process, but that's my thoughts for the above comment and the issue raised by the OP comment about page size and complexity on Medium.

logicallee 10y ago

The argument makes perfect sense. Nobody can use the theoretical swiss army knife pictured in the article - it's too wide, and ridiculous. In the graphicon of over-engineering taking over users and enveloping them, pushing design out of the way, it implies that the result is hostile to users, and pushes design out of the way. But where we read this is an example of the person selecting the "knife" in question out of every single blogging platform on the planet. So, the swiss army knife pictured is inaccurate, it's a straw man. Secondly, the author clearly finds the design appropriate enough to use, and a great match for their user stories. So whereas the central thesis in the article says: > "small, elegant, and successful systems tend to be plagued with feature creep due to inflated expectations". The author is not using a "small, elegant, succcessful system". Perhaps the swiss army knife pictured is the best knife on the planet, and not one of the worst. This fundamentally undercuts the point the author is making.

markcerqueira 10y ago
I believe the comment I was replying to was saying one should not use Medium because it is an "over-engineered blogging platform." I was not arguing for creating or using theoretical swiss army knifes.