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I think this reaction is natural when you feel like you're doing something for others but it never comes out feeling right. First, even when we do something fo

I think this reaction is natural when you feel like you're doing something for others but it never comes out feeling right. First, even when we do something for "free" we're usually deriving some value out of it. We enjoy the work. We like the feel of progress, or praise. It's very rarely as altruistic as we want to believe. Finally, what does this tell users, past, present or future? Are we dealing with people who will take our feedback constructively? I've been in positions like this and have had this impulse many times but it's not fair to work on something and then demand people kiss your ring for doing so. I've treated users like this and really regret it in retrospect.

yakubin 4y ago
The author of the mail did not provide constructive feedback. It's just a personal attack.
- nkozyra 4y ago
  My point was that if I'm a user with feedback should I share it if there's a chance I'm going to be put to task publicly for doing so? Am I getting a receptive audience?
  - yakubin 4y ago
    Makes sense.
  - mannykannot 4y ago
    If the only way you could do so is in the manner of Tom's rant, then no, you should not give any "feedback." If you are worried that even reasonable comments or suggestions might receive this sort of response, then, for your own sake, just move on. Note that this sort of reply is not being put to task publicly, as the person in question has not ben identified.
  - booleandilemma 4y ago
    Tom's a dick.
    - zem 4y ago
      yeah, he had no need to harry the developer like that!
- criley2 4y ago
  Our users often get emotional and vent their frustration with bad UX in unproductive ways. But that does not mean the feedback is not helpful or constructive. The users email did in fact contain several constructive complaints about the UX, including settings, user defined languages, styles, global overrides. They discussed difficulty in setting background color and highlight effects. They even provided a comparison to a different product (google search) to demonstrate alternative UX. I think angry user emails can be some of the most enlightening ones with regards to learning about the real UX
  - yakubin 4y ago
    All I can take out from his complaints is that he doesn't understand settings. I don't know what he doesn't understand about them, what exactly is wrong with them. I'm not sure I would call that constructive. Constructive would be something like: "I wanted to do X, so I tried doing Y, I expected Z to happen, but instead got W".
    - criley2 4y ago
      No offense but you need to level up your empathy/reading skills then. This is a canonical example of user feedback. Your user feedback isn't going to be coming from the lead developer on a major product or a Comp Sci PhD or a highly talented software designer that can effortlessly (and for free) breakdown problems and suggest efficient and powerful solutions in a long-form report. This right here is how users tell us our UX sucks. We either listen or we don't, but how we treat our users is very core to how well our products do.
      - yakubin 4y ago
        > No offense but you need to level up your empathy/reading skills then. Can you deduce what went wrong from what he wrote? > Your user feedback isn't going to be coming from the lead developer on a major product or a Comp Sci PhD or a highly talented software designer that can effortlessly (and for free) breakdown problems and suggest efficient and powerful solutions in a long-form report. He doesn't need to suggest solutions. He just needs to communicate what happened. There is nothing in this mail about what he tried doing with settings - where he clicked and what he expected to happen. > (and for free) Goes both ways in this case.
nmstoker 4y ago
Am i reading your response correctly? You disapprove of the software author's response out of a concern over how they got back to a rude inconsiderate individual? The email from the user is more a rant than feedback. Granted some could define literally any response as feedback but to me it doesn't qualify, certainly not as constructive feedback.
- nkozyra 4y ago
  You read this right. There's no benefit to publicly chastising a user - even a rude one. If I'm a user who reads this I'm extremely unlikely to ever offer feedback in even the nicest possible tone. I think the right move is to extract any possible useful feedback from the email and hit delete. Even if you send this email, publicly posting it seems an even less useful move. When you have users you will have unsatisfied users. When you have unsatisfied users you will have rude users. If you're rude to your users you will eventually have no users. It is often a thankless job to maintain a product or service like this but we do get pleasure and enjoyment from it. It's hard to get bad or rude feedback but it comes with the territory.
  - arghwhat 4y ago
    That we gain some personal joy in maintaining our open source projects does not in any way mean that we need care about inconsiderate jerks throwing rocks at the man years of work we give them for free. The personal joy is ours to treasure, not something we have to pay users for. Rather, if users want to have commercial grade "smile even though we're being told to go die in a fire for our shitty product" support, then they should pay actual money first. The trips to the psychologist required from that isn't free after all.
    - nkozyra 4y ago
      > That we gain some personal joy in maintaining our open source projects does not in any way mean that we need care about inconsiderate jerks throwing rocks at the man years of work we give them for free. Oh I agree. Nobody has to care about this. Trash the email on sight. This is more about the message being sent to other users. To me this feels very much like one's opinions carry as much weight as they pay for it and if the author doesn't like your feedback you might end up on that next release page.
darkerside 4y ago
Wow, what a horrible attitude. He isn't claiming to be Mother Teresa, he just wants people who are benefiting from his work to not treat him like shit. It's not a big ask. I have no doubt the author would be very receptive to constructive feedback. But it's hard to listen politely when someone sends a snotty email like that, and belies their own ignorance with questions like "what is a global override anyway???" (Hint: ask that nicely first, because then your other questions might become obvious). I'm sure author has no shortage of constructive feedback to benefit from. This? This is trash. And that he's turned it into fodder for his own amusement and others, is just one more gift to us all, that yes, he happened to also derive his own pleasure from.
sime2009 4y ago
> but it's not fair to work on something and then demand people kiss your ring for doing so. True, but it is fair to expect that people who have paid nothing and have nothing constructive to add to quietly STFU.
avgcorrection 4y ago
Going by their own words, the motivations of OSS maintainers are weird. They complain that people don’t appreciate their efforts. Little money in it. So when do they get some payoff? Apparently these moments of catharsis where they get to vent their frustration against the freeloaders. They’re like rich people who hate taxes and yet pay double on it anyway, just so they can tell off people who they consider to be freeloaders. Just upload your code and forget about it, then. Or keep the code to yourself. Because the social side of OSS doesn’t seem to be working for you.

yakubin 4y ago

The author of the mail did not provide constructive feedback. It's just a personal attack.

nkozyra 4y ago
My point was that if I'm a user with feedback should I share it if there's a chance I'm going to be put to task publicly for doing so? Am I getting a receptive audience?
- yakubin 4y ago
  Makes sense.
- mannykannot 4y ago
  If the only way you could do so is in the manner of Tom's rant, then no, you should not give any "feedback." If you are worried that even reasonable comments or suggestions might receive this sort of response, then, for your own sake, just move on. Note that this sort of reply is not being put to task publicly, as the person in question has not ben identified.
- booleandilemma 4y ago
  Tom's a dick.
  - zem 4y ago
    yeah, he had no need to harry the developer like that!
criley2 4y ago
Our users often get emotional and vent their frustration with bad UX in unproductive ways. But that does not mean the feedback is not helpful or constructive. The users email did in fact contain several constructive complaints about the UX, including settings, user defined languages, styles, global overrides. They discussed difficulty in setting background color and highlight effects. They even provided a comparison to a different product (google search) to demonstrate alternative UX. I think angry user emails can be some of the most enlightening ones with regards to learning about the real UX
- yakubin 4y ago
  All I can take out from his complaints is that he doesn't understand settings. I don't know what he doesn't understand about them, what exactly is wrong with them. I'm not sure I would call that constructive. Constructive would be something like: "I wanted to do X, so I tried doing Y, I expected Z to happen, but instead got W".
  - criley2 4y ago
    No offense but you need to level up your empathy/reading skills then. This is a canonical example of user feedback. Your user feedback isn't going to be coming from the lead developer on a major product or a Comp Sci PhD or a highly talented software designer that can effortlessly (and for free) breakdown problems and suggest efficient and powerful solutions in a long-form report. This right here is how users tell us our UX sucks. We either listen or we don't, but how we treat our users is very core to how well our products do.
    - yakubin 4y ago
      > No offense but you need to level up your empathy/reading skills then. Can you deduce what went wrong from what he wrote? > Your user feedback isn't going to be coming from the lead developer on a major product or a Comp Sci PhD or a highly talented software designer that can effortlessly (and for free) breakdown problems and suggest efficient and powerful solutions in a long-form report. He doesn't need to suggest solutions. He just needs to communicate what happened. There is nothing in this mail about what he tried doing with settings - where he clicked and what he expected to happen. > (and for free) Goes both ways in this case.

nmstoker 4y ago

Am i reading your response correctly? You disapprove of the software author's response out of a concern over how they got back to a rude inconsiderate individual? The email from the user is more a rant than feedback. Granted some could define literally any response as feedback but to me it doesn't qualify, certainly not as constructive feedback.

nkozyra 4y ago
You read this right. There's no benefit to publicly chastising a user - even a rude one. If I'm a user who reads this I'm extremely unlikely to ever offer feedback in even the nicest possible tone. I think the right move is to extract any possible useful feedback from the email and hit delete. Even if you send this email, publicly posting it seems an even less useful move. When you have users you will have unsatisfied users. When you have unsatisfied users you will have rude users. If you're rude to your users you will eventually have no users. It is often a thankless job to maintain a product or service like this but we do get pleasure and enjoyment from it. It's hard to get bad or rude feedback but it comes with the territory.
- arghwhat 4y ago
  That we gain some personal joy in maintaining our open source projects does not in any way mean that we need care about inconsiderate jerks throwing rocks at the man years of work we give them for free. The personal joy is ours to treasure, not something we have to pay users for. Rather, if users want to have commercial grade "smile even though we're being told to go die in a fire for our shitty product" support, then they should pay actual money first. The trips to the psychologist required from that isn't free after all.
  - nkozyra 4y ago
    > That we gain some personal joy in maintaining our open source projects does not in any way mean that we need care about inconsiderate jerks throwing rocks at the man years of work we give them for free. Oh I agree. Nobody has to care about this. Trash the email on sight. This is more about the message being sent to other users. To me this feels very much like one's opinions carry as much weight as they pay for it and if the author doesn't like your feedback you might end up on that next release page.

darkerside 4y ago

Wow, what a horrible attitude. He isn't claiming to be Mother Teresa, he just wants people who are benefiting from his work to not treat him like shit. It's not a big ask. I have no doubt the author would be very receptive to constructive feedback. But it's hard to listen politely when someone sends a snotty email like that, and belies their own ignorance with questions like "what is a global override anyway???" (Hint: ask that nicely first, because then your other questions might become obvious). I'm sure author has no shortage of constructive feedback to benefit from. This? This is trash. And that he's turned it into fodder for his own amusement and others, is just one more gift to us all, that yes, he happened to also derive his own pleasure from.

sime2009 4y ago

> but it's not fair to work on something and then demand people kiss your ring for doing so. True, but it is fair to expect that people who have paid nothing and have nothing constructive to add to quietly STFU.

avgcorrection 4y ago

Going by their own words, the motivations of OSS maintainers are weird. They complain that people don’t appreciate their efforts. Little money in it. So when do they get some payoff? Apparently these moments of catharsis where they get to vent their frustration against the freeloaders. They’re like rich people who hate taxes and yet pay double on it anyway, just so they can tell off people who they consider to be freeloaders. Just upload your code and forget about it, then. Or keep the code to yourself. Because the social side of OSS doesn’t seem to be working for you.