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Ask HN: Products that suck but you still use? (2020)

Fellow user albertgudl asked this question a year ago:[1] "What are products you use frequently but still hate/they suck? What are products you use frequently but think they could be done better?" Does anyone have something to add this year? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19715548

notkaiho 6y ago
Spotify. The Mac desktop app often stops being able to play songs until you can restart the app, an issue they've been aware of for months if not a year. The catalogue is an absolute mess and there's no way to report metadata issues, or transparency about which editions records are based on. But it syncs nicely with my phone, lets me download songs for listening on planes, and has decent little features like discovery playlists.
- non-entity 6y ago
  I have an issue with the android app will it will randomly show as offline. This is a pain in the ass when I'm using my phone to play stuff on my desktop, pick a new song and it plays from my phone. The only way to fix it seems to restart the app and / or wait a little while
- paypalcust83 6y ago
  I haven't had that exact problem. On iOS and macOS, a new session from idling a long time often won't start playing the last track, saying it can't find it. Another annoyance is when someone edits the playlists or licensing situation may have changed, and songs just drop out of existence, so you never really "own" anything and there's zero permanence. It's better to have your own collection and use Spot, Last or Panda as discovery mechanisms.
  - notkaiho 6y ago
    The money involved in getting the level of breadth of music I listen to on any given week would be absolutely prohibitive compared to the monthly subscription fee.
    - paypalcust83 6y ago
      I don't have that problem. :)
- gcatalfamo 6y ago
  I listen to it in my car. There is bug after a while that songs keep interrupting exactly at second 00:10. And you have to restart everything, car included, to make it start working again.
Spooky23 6y ago
Microsoft Outlook - because work. Apple Music.app - gets worse with every release.
oldsklgdfth 6y ago
Amazon.com If I don't find what I need in the first few results I have to scroll endlessly. No amount of filtering or sorting helps. The browsing experience is lacking. I think most people have been trained to buy specific items, rather than searching for the product that is good for them.
- agitator 6y ago
  Yeah the shopping "experience" on amazon is horrible. However, I don't think I have used an amazon product where the UX wasn't a mess...
- gt565k 6y ago
  I did not renew my amazon.com prime membership this year and I'm about to cancel my prime credit card. I think the covid lockdown really made me look at what I was spending money on. 95% of my orders on amazon were things I did not need within 2-3 days, heck even a week. And probably 50% of the things I bought I did not need at all. Not to mention I could have purchased them in retail stores. While Amazon is convenient to shop, it is also dangerous. The ability to quickly look at products and buy things with the click of a button can be addicting.
lesderid 6y ago
As a former power user of Inbox, Gmail. It has a ton of icons and labels and whatnot that for me provide only clutter. They never completely integrated the 'tasks' or 'notes' or whatever they used to call it either. It's also much slower to load.
rawgabbit 6y ago
MS Outlook. MS Windows. Anki.
- misiti3780 6y ago
  Anki isnt that bad!
- Jefro118 6y ago
  What do you dislike about Anki?
  - misiti3780 6y ago
    the general complaint i see the most often is it's too complicated to use -- but if you read the manual (which is good), most of those confusion goes away. anki does a lot of things, but all of the defaults are sensible
gshdg 6y ago
Apple’s mail apps. The dishwasher in my rental apartment. Slack’s API docs. Modern web browsers. Google search.
daneyh 6y ago
Calibre for book library management. The UI stinks to high hell but apparently developer DGAF. Has so many great features and i'm not sure of any alternatives that gets even close what calibre can do.
- seige 6y ago
  Omg, my eyes hurt. Do you use it? If yes, mind giving a use case where its useful?
swah 6y ago
Linux :) Rages me every other day, but also good enough. Terminator, VSCode and Chrome: mostly love. GUI file managers, display stuff: mostly hate.
open-source-ux 6y ago
There are so many - where to start? - Microsoft Outlook, Excel, Word (the desktop apps) - Google Sheets, Android, GMail - Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects etc) - Git, GitHub - Apple Finder - Dropbox, Dropbox Paper Not products, but technologies: most programming languages, CSS, most APIs, anything with the description "static site generator"
keiferski 6y ago
Taking regular bicycles on elevators or other tight spaces. Getting my bike up to my apartment is a huge hassle, but leaving it outside will get it stolen. I wish there were a quicker way to disassemble a standard, non-folding bike on the fly.
billconan 6y ago
gimp, gitk, xcode
w321amw8 6y ago
Job boards.... is it me or are they all shit?
ak39 6y ago
Gimp
jurgenwerk 6y ago
Evernote. Terrible UX, sluggish, indexing problems.

notkaiho 6y ago

Spotify. The Mac desktop app often stops being able to play songs until you can restart the app, an issue they've been aware of for months if not a year. The catalogue is an absolute mess and there's no way to report metadata issues, or transparency about which editions records are based on. But it syncs nicely with my phone, lets me download songs for listening on planes, and has decent little features like discovery playlists.

non-entity 6y ago
I have an issue with the android app will it will randomly show as offline. This is a pain in the ass when I'm using my phone to play stuff on my desktop, pick a new song and it plays from my phone. The only way to fix it seems to restart the app and / or wait a little while
paypalcust83 6y ago
I haven't had that exact problem. On iOS and macOS, a new session from idling a long time often won't start playing the last track, saying it can't find it. Another annoyance is when someone edits the playlists or licensing situation may have changed, and songs just drop out of existence, so you never really "own" anything and there's zero permanence. It's better to have your own collection and use Spot, Last or Panda as discovery mechanisms.
- notkaiho 6y ago
  The money involved in getting the level of breadth of music I listen to on any given week would be absolutely prohibitive compared to the monthly subscription fee.
  - paypalcust83 6y ago
    I don't have that problem. :)
gcatalfamo 6y ago
I listen to it in my car. There is bug after a while that songs keep interrupting exactly at second 00:10. And you have to restart everything, car included, to make it start working again.

Spooky23 6y ago

Microsoft Outlook - because work. Apple Music.app - gets worse with every release.

oldsklgdfth 6y ago

Amazon.com If I don't find what I need in the first few results I have to scroll endlessly. No amount of filtering or sorting helps. The browsing experience is lacking. I think most people have been trained to buy specific items, rather than searching for the product that is good for them.

agitator 6y ago
Yeah the shopping "experience" on amazon is horrible. However, I don't think I have used an amazon product where the UX wasn't a mess...
gt565k 6y ago
I did not renew my amazon.com prime membership this year and I'm about to cancel my prime credit card. I think the covid lockdown really made me look at what I was spending money on. 95% of my orders on amazon were things I did not need within 2-3 days, heck even a week. And probably 50% of the things I bought I did not need at all. Not to mention I could have purchased them in retail stores. While Amazon is convenient to shop, it is also dangerous. The ability to quickly look at products and buy things with the click of a button can be addicting.

lesderid 6y ago

As a former power user of Inbox, Gmail. It has a ton of icons and labels and whatnot that for me provide only clutter. They never completely integrated the 'tasks' or 'notes' or whatever they used to call it either. It's also much slower to load.

rawgabbit 6y ago

MS Outlook. MS Windows. Anki.

misiti3780 6y ago
Anki isnt that bad!
Jefro118 6y ago
What do you dislike about Anki?
- misiti3780 6y ago
  the general complaint i see the most often is it's too complicated to use -- but if you read the manual (which is good), most of those confusion goes away. anki does a lot of things, but all of the defaults are sensible

gshdg 6y ago

Apple’s mail apps. The dishwasher in my rental apartment. Slack’s API docs. Modern web browsers. Google search.

daneyh 6y ago

Calibre for book library management. The UI stinks to high hell but apparently developer DGAF. Has so many great features and i'm not sure of any alternatives that gets even close what calibre can do.

seige 6y ago
Omg, my eyes hurt. Do you use it? If yes, mind giving a use case where its useful?

swah 6y ago

Linux :) Rages me every other day, but also good enough. Terminator, VSCode and Chrome: mostly love. GUI file managers, display stuff: mostly hate.

open-source-ux 6y ago

There are so many - where to start? - Microsoft Outlook, Excel, Word (the desktop apps) - Google Sheets, Android, GMail - Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects etc) - Git, GitHub - Apple Finder - Dropbox, Dropbox Paper Not products, but technologies: most programming languages, CSS, most APIs, anything with the description "static site generator"

keiferski 6y ago

Taking regular bicycles on elevators or other tight spaces. Getting my bike up to my apartment is a huge hassle, but leaving it outside will get it stolen. I wish there were a quicker way to disassemble a standard, non-folding bike on the fly.

billconan 6y ago

gimp, gitk, xcode

w321amw8 6y ago

Job boards.... is it me or are they all shit?

ak39 6y ago

Gimp

jurgenwerk 6y ago

Evernote. Terrible UX, sluggish, indexing problems.