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> A better model for thinking of users is to realise that they are not stupid, just busy and distracted. I'd put it differently. Realize that your app is not t

by jwr 6y ago

> A better model for thinking of users is to realise that they are not stupid, just busy and distracted. I'd put it differently. Realize that your app is not the center of the world. Your users have things to do, and using your app is a small fraction of their life. Even though it might be your baby and you might be spending all of your waking ours thinking about your app, user perspective is different.

nikki93 6y ago
Maybe the user is like a person walking down the street and your app is your kid with girl scout cookies boxes it's trying to sell, and you're helping it out. :) And it's not about the money as much as the app growing up, or something.
tremon 6y ago
Or, more bluntly: realize that your app is a tool, not a goal. Tools should be predictable, reliable, and easy to use correctly.
- grugagag 6y ago
  And intuitive! Since apps are like a blackbox to the user, they shouldn’t do things that make the user hesitate or get confused. With feature creep most apps become an unmanageable piece of mess
bonoboTP 6y ago
It reminds me of teachers' and professors' attitude towards their classes/courses. From their point of view, it's maybe the only thing they teach or one of 2-3 things and it's the general topic they spend all their time on. From a student's perspective it's one of many courses in various topics. They can't be expected to laser focus on just the class that you teach. But many teachers don't get this concept. They think everything revolves around their course only.
- mb7733 6y ago
  That's funny, because the inverse problem exists too. Many students think that teaching is all that professors do. They assume that the prof's whole life revolves around teaching their class, when in fact the bulk of the prof's job is research, supervision and administration.
justinclift 6y ago
This is what frustrates the heck out of me when platforms decide to redo their entire user experience, just because they feel the need to "change something". Thereby forcing all of their users to learn the new UI immediately, not even with due warning. One or two platforms doing is in a week or so is a pain. But when lots of platforms do this in a short period of it, it can be "throw hands up in the air and do something else". :(

by jwr 6y ago

nikki93 6y ago

Maybe the user is like a person walking down the street and your app is your kid with girl scout cookies boxes it's trying to sell, and you're helping it out. :) And it's not about the money as much as the app growing up, or something.

tremon 6y ago

Or, more bluntly: realize that your app is a tool, not a goal. Tools should be predictable, reliable, and easy to use correctly.

grugagag 6y ago
And intuitive! Since apps are like a blackbox to the user, they shouldn’t do things that make the user hesitate or get confused. With feature creep most apps become an unmanageable piece of mess

bonoboTP 6y ago

It reminds me of teachers' and professors' attitude towards their classes/courses. From their point of view, it's maybe the only thing they teach or one of 2-3 things and it's the general topic they spend all their time on. From a student's perspective it's one of many courses in various topics. They can't be expected to laser focus on just the class that you teach. But many teachers don't get this concept. They think everything revolves around their course only.

mb7733 6y ago
That's funny, because the inverse problem exists too. Many students think that teaching is all that professors do. They assume that the prof's whole life revolves around teaching their class, when in fact the bulk of the prof's job is research, supervision and administration.

justinclift 6y ago

This is what frustrates the heck out of me when platforms decide to redo their entire user experience, just because they feel the need to "change something". Thereby forcing all of their users to learn the new UI immediately, not even with due warning. One or two platforms doing is in a week or so is a pain. But when lots of platforms do this in a short period of it, it can be "throw hands up in the air and do something else". :(