6 ms·

User-friendliness and fascism

39 points by iamelgringo 16y ago

bradleyland 16y ago
Boy is this contrived. Control != fascism. A private corporation cannot be "fascist", because it has no governance over its populace (customers). I can choose, at any time, to purchase another brand of device. Choosing another government is not nearly as simple.
- michaelchisari 16y ago
  A private corporation cannot be "fascist", because it has no governance over its populace (customers). I somewhat disagree, there have definitely been points in history when corporations have exerted control over a populace, although most generally it's workers, not it's customers, through the use of private security like Pinkertons, and through company towns. However, Apple really doesn't fit that bill. I agree that this is a very awkward metaphor.
- powertower 16y ago
  Every time you purchase blank cd/dvd media you pay an additional tax that is federally mandated and goes to a private corporation. "A private copying levy (also known as blank media tax or levy) is a government-mandated scheme in which a special tax or levy (additional to any general sales tax) is charged on purchases of recordable media." I'd say
  - bradleyland 16y ago
    Even if this were an example of fascism, which it's not, the government is the entity enforcing this tax, not the corporation. It'd be great to not have corporations lobbying our government for ridiculous schemes like this, but the solution is not to attack the corporation. They've not broken any laws, and they're not the ones who created them in the first place. The problem is the government who allows it.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
Perceval 16y ago
The commenter/Economist writer gets their political art history wrong. Apple's roots lie in the Bauhaus, not in a fascist model of politics/art. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus The Bauhaus was broadly socialist, persecuted by the Nazis, but believed that industrial mass production would allow architects, artists, and designers to bring art/design cheaply to the masses. You can see that line of thinking about product and design from Jony Ive back to Dieter Rams and on back to the Bauhaus. A great deal of modern architecture (e.g. the International School came out of Bauhaus émigrés to the U.S. – Gropius and van der Rohe) is derived from the Bauhaus. Modern architecture has been criticized not only initially by fascists, but subsequently by a broader cross section of society, because the architects were making concrete, glass, and steel structures than had little or no human touch (cf. the landscape of Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange). Tom Wolfe wrote a short critique of modern architecture in 1981 called From Bauhaus to Our House. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Bauhaus_to_Our_House http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Bauhaus_to_Our_House The socialist aesthetic, privileging the designer, can be just as controlling in its way as the fascist aesthetic. But this article gets Apple's aesthetic lineage and politics wrong seemingly out of sheer ignorance.
- chrismealy 16y ago
  The socialist aesthetic can also be as gentle and humanistic as William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morris
  - Perceval 16y ago
    Of course, and part of the rivalry between Frank Lloyd Wright and the Internationalists was FLW's inspiration (among other sources of inspiration) drawn from the Arts & Crafts (which itself drew from the Pre-Raphaelites). That said, FLW's politics were not strictly socialist, but were a complex combination of liberatarian, pacifism, populism, Wisconsin progressive, support for the Wobblies, and anti-semitism. Some argue that he was also close to Kropotkin (an anarchist). This earned him the suspicion of J. Edgar Hoover and a file in the FBI.
mahrain 16y ago
To the author: "GNU/Linux, have you heard of it?"
- alexqgb 16y ago
  More to the point, have his readers? Assuming they haven't (a safe bet), its metaphorical value in framing a larger political problem is nil.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
jaysonelliot 16y ago
I'm not a fan of the phrase "user friendly." I've been a UX professional for fifteen years, focusing on the field of usability. To me, "user friendly" evokes images of Microsoft Bob, software "wizards" that leave no room for user control, and chirpy in-dash car systems that overload the user with icons and friendly messages, instead of just getting the usability right in the first place. I prefer the term "user subservient." A good system should be subservient to the user, easy to understand, but ultimately leaving the user in control. Apple and Microsoft go too far towards "user friendly," and the Linux approach veers too far towards user control without usability.
- alexqgb 16y ago
  You, sir, have nailed it. I wish I could upvote this a hundred times.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
hammock 16y ago
The author is just pointing out that Apple is a model of centralized control, one-way order-giving and -taking. For some people a word to describe that philosophy is "fascist." For these people, fascism is not a form of government; rather it is a method, a toolset for achieving your ends.
spinchange 16y ago
I think analogy is more apt including Linux (bear with me on this) The current system is (sort-of) like Linux. Pretty ad-hoc and less easy to use / figure out for the un-initiated. Often basic things are left out, not because they don't exist or work, but over principle. The Democrats want to upgrade the current HC system to a Mac and the Republicans are certain that we'll end up with Windows instead.
joebadmo 16y ago
I'm conflicted on the signified, maybe because I'm conflicted on the signifier. I would be less conflicted, I think, if Apple products really did "just work" as so many Apple adherents purport. But from my experience, it's just a matter of degree, i.e. Apple products "just work" more often than MS products do, but not that much more often anymore, and when Apple products don't work, they don't work harder (or maybe it just feels that way because people have so little experience trying to get non-working things to work?). On a more abstract level, it just feels weird and maybe subversive to characterize the restriction of choice as freedom. I mean, it does make a sort of sense, esp. after taking human psychology into account in that restricting choice to a manageable level might make it easier for people to make decisions. But it still feels weird. Maybe it just exposes "freedom" as a flawed concept, and a tense balance between orders of magnitude-larger forces is all there is. That's a weird Lovecraftian world to live in, though.

39 points by iamelgringo 16y ago

Boy is this contrived. Control != fascism. A private corporation cannot be "fascist", because it has no governance over its populace (customers). I can choose, at any time, to purchase another brand of device. Choosing another government is not nearly as simple.

michaelchisari 16y ago
A private corporation cannot be "fascist", because it has no governance over its populace (customers). I somewhat disagree, there have definitely been points in history when corporations have exerted control over a populace, although most generally it's workers, not it's customers, through the use of private security like Pinkertons, and through company towns. However, Apple really doesn't fit that bill. I agree that this is a very awkward metaphor.
powertower 16y ago
Every time you purchase blank cd/dvd media you pay an additional tax that is federally mandated and goes to a private corporation. "A private copying levy (also known as blank media tax or levy) is a government-mandated scheme in which a special tax or levy (additional to any general sales tax) is charged on purchases of recordable media." I'd say
- bradleyland 16y ago
  Even if this were an example of fascism, which it's not, the government is the entity enforcing this tax, not the corporation. It'd be great to not have corporations lobbying our government for ridiculous schemes like this, but the solution is not to attack the corporation. They've not broken any laws, and they're not the ones who created them in the first place. The problem is the government who allows it.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

Perceval 16y ago

The commenter/Economist writer gets their political art history wrong. Apple's roots lie in the Bauhaus, not in a fascist model of politics/art. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus The Bauhaus was broadly socialist, persecuted by the Nazis, but believed that industrial mass production would allow architects, artists, and designers to bring art/design cheaply to the masses. You can see that line of thinking about product and design from Jony Ive back to Dieter Rams and on back to the Bauhaus. A great deal of modern architecture (e.g. the International School came out of Bauhaus émigrés to the U.S. – Gropius and van der Rohe) is derived from the Bauhaus. Modern architecture has been criticized not only initially by fascists, but subsequently by a broader cross section of society, because the architects were making concrete, glass, and steel structures than had little or no human touch (cf. the landscape of Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange). Tom Wolfe wrote a short critique of modern architecture in 1981 called From Bauhaus to Our House. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Bauhaus_to_Our_House http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Bauhaus_to_Our_House The socialist aesthetic, privileging the designer, can be just as controlling in its way as the fascist aesthetic. But this article gets Apple's aesthetic lineage and politics wrong seemingly out of sheer ignorance.

chrismealy 16y ago
The socialist aesthetic can also be as gentle and humanistic as William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Morris
- Perceval 16y ago
  Of course, and part of the rivalry between Frank Lloyd Wright and the Internationalists was FLW's inspiration (among other sources of inspiration) drawn from the Arts & Crafts (which itself drew from the Pre-Raphaelites). That said, FLW's politics were not strictly socialist, but were a complex combination of liberatarian, pacifism, populism, Wisconsin progressive, support for the Wobblies, and anti-semitism. Some argue that he was also close to Kropotkin (an anarchist). This earned him the suspicion of J. Edgar Hoover and a file in the FBI.

mahrain 16y ago

To the author: "GNU/Linux, have you heard of it?"

alexqgb 16y ago
More to the point, have his readers? Assuming they haven't (a safe bet), its metaphorical value in framing a larger political problem is nil.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

jaysonelliot 16y ago

I'm not a fan of the phrase "user friendly." I've been a UX professional for fifteen years, focusing on the field of usability. To me, "user friendly" evokes images of Microsoft Bob, software "wizards" that leave no room for user control, and chirpy in-dash car systems that overload the user with icons and friendly messages, instead of just getting the usability right in the first place. I prefer the term "user subservient." A good system should be subservient to the user, easy to understand, but ultimately leaving the user in control. Apple and Microsoft go too far towards "user friendly," and the Linux approach veers too far towards user control without usability.

alexqgb 16y ago
You, sir, have nailed it. I wish I could upvote this a hundred times.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

hammock 16y ago

The author is just pointing out that Apple is a model of centralized control, one-way order-giving and -taking. For some people a word to describe that philosophy is "fascist." For these people, fascism is not a form of government; rather it is a method, a toolset for achieving your ends.

spinchange 16y ago

I think analogy is more apt including Linux (bear with me on this) The current system is (sort-of) like Linux. Pretty ad-hoc and less easy to use / figure out for the un-initiated. Often basic things are left out, not because they don't exist or work, but over principle. The Democrats want to upgrade the current HC system to a Mac and the Republicans are certain that we'll end up with Windows instead.

joebadmo 16y ago

I'm conflicted on the signified, maybe because I'm conflicted on the signifier. I would be less conflicted, I think, if Apple products really did "just work" as so many Apple adherents purport. But from my experience, it's just a matter of degree, i.e. Apple products "just work" more often than MS products do, but not that much more often anymore, and when Apple products don't work, they don't work harder (or maybe it just feels that way because people have so little experience trying to get non-working things to work?). On a more abstract level, it just feels weird and maybe subversive to characterize the restriction of choice as freedom. I mean, it does make a sort of sense, esp. after taking human psychology into account in that restricting choice to a manageable level might make it easier for people to make decisions. But it still feels weird. Maybe it just exposes "freedom" as a flawed concept, and a tense balance between orders of magnitude-larger forces is all there is. That's a weird Lovecraftian world to live in, though.