I worked in this industry with blackboard, making something similar. The truth is that the school administrators hold the purse strings. They also don't actuall

I worked in this industry with blackboard, making something similar. The truth is that the school administrators hold the purse strings. They also don't actually have very much money to begin with - margins are tighter because your price per user is much lower than most business to business end-user systems. The users absolutely want features. And you hear about them. Its the joy of the developers working on it to actually deliver it to them. But the admins don't care. They don't want user-level features and ease of use. They want reports. Lots of reports. They want a system that will generate a report on anything, in exactly the format and UX that they desire, ad hoc. And then they want it to be customizable in every way possible. This is where the majority of work goes, because the people with the purse strings demand it. If they demanded a better UX, they'd get it, and the developers working on it would be MUCH happier. We had one of the "better" UX's but it got older, and work couldn't be prioritized onto it. So really, the parent definitely rings true to me. The incentives from the "buyers" is NEVER about a good UX. Its an afterthought. Maybe if the buyers were more accountable to those having to use it this would change.