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I don't like XXX, so it shouldn't exist it's a great argument.

• onli 10y ago
  No, of course not. It wasn't supposed to be the argument. Are you really interested in the background? I will just assume so, this is HN after all. Our brain has some special recognition for specific things. A collection of those things are bundled under Gestalt psychology. There are also a number of things that make something pop out. Now, movement triggers the pop out effect, it is one of those things that we notice immediately. What that means in practice is that a blinking cursor in an otherwise plain image will be noticed immediately, and it takes conscious effort to ignore it. That is a strain on your mental capacities, and highly unnerving, even if you are not completely aware of what it is that annoys you. Parts of this is what motivates those specialized writer editors, that remove everything apart from pure trext to make it as easy as possible to focus on the task at hand. Blinking cursors, and this is what the jurta page mentions, also resemble the chinese waterdrop torture. I think that was meant a bit tongue in cheek, but is actually not wrong. It comes again and again and again and again ..., and it not immediately controllable. Add to that the useless resource usage like in this bug and yes, I stand to that and am serious about it: Blinking cursors are a very bad habit that should just die out. And developers that actively implement it without making it deactivable should ask themselves what they are doing - I had that with Sharelatex, a platform which I otherwise like a lot.