7 ms·
Programmers sometimes have that experience, as do musicians, hardware designers, film directors, novelists, painters, game designers and all other professions t
by atoav 3y ago
Programmers sometimes have that experience, as do musicians, hardware designers, film directors, novelists, painters, game designers and all other professions that create things regular people interact with casually.
Consumers (specifically the sub-genre of critics) often have no real imagination what making a thing means and under which constraints it happens. They often see publishing a imperfect work to the public as an affront to their sophisticated intellect and taste, even (or especially?) if it is free.
In German there is the saying: Wer macht, hat recht which translates to who makes is right. Complaining is simple, just shut up and do it better.
Of course complaining is totally okay if we e.g. talk about social or political conditions, or some mandatory process you have to subject yourself to by law. But even there I hate people who just complain and leave it at that without even trying to change a thing.
- prennert 3y agoMaybe the solution is to brand yourself as an "auteur programmer".
- School-Cotton 3y agoProgrammauteur
- scns 3y agoApologies in advance for my choice of words. I used to be a person that criticized a lot. One day i realized what an cheap ass i was. Talking is easy. Now i say silently to myself: "Shut up or do it better yourself." It is very healthy to remove narcissistic micromanagers (driven by subconcious anxiety) from your life if you can.
- lynx23 3y agoThere is one counter example to your position that immediately comes to mind: architects! If you create something, the primary driver should be its users, and not your ego. I believe there should be a law which mandates that architects need to stay at least 5 years in every building they "design" so that they actually see and feel the consequences of their work. Art might be a different issue, but just because someone is creative does not free them from the responsibility to build something useful! If the user experience is no fun, the user has every right to complain.
- nextlevelwizard 3y ago>If you create something, the primary driver should be its users, and not your ego. Again, it depends on why you are designing something. If your goal is to just stroke your ego then you probably aren't going to care about the end user.
- lynx23 3y agoWhich is fine as long as your end users are not implicitly forced to use your creation. So an artist creating a controversial sculpture is totally fine, nobody forces the recipient to consume their art. But buildings are different, they should be user-centric, not vanity-projects to boost your career.
- mejutoco 3y agoThey should, but they do not. Whenever I see "should" in a sentence I think: why is this not how things are? What are the incentives? In this case: who is the person deciding what gets built? What are the consequences for being over budget? (Calatrava I am looking at you).
- algorias 3y agoThe special thing about architecture is that it imposes on others. You can't not see a building. So I agree with the conclusion but not the reasoning. It's not users vs creators, it's the public who are not the users that get harmed by ugly buildings, even if those buildings are private and desired by those who pay for them. (The government commissioning ugly public buildings is a problem with the government, not the architects) Meanwhile, anything on the internet you're reading/watching/listening to is by your choice.
- nextlevelwizard 3y ago>Complaining is simple, just shut up and do it better. This is a good rule to go by. It is always way easier to critique a thing for whatever reason and critique can be good, but only to a point. When you start writing articles about how thing X is bad because of Y, you aren't doing any favors for anyone. You should instead try to channel that into something positive.
- capitol_ 3y agoBut people who write criticisms provide a valuable service to me as an consumer. I have limited amount of time and before I spend 20 hours on a book or game I would like some indication that it's not a waste of time. One could argue that both the good and the bad should be highlighted, but my experience is that I'm get most value from knowing about the bad parts.
- WastingMyTime89 3y agoDifferent people interact with things and have different reactions. Some are moved enough to develop strong feelings. Some share them nicely. Some write hyperbolic forum posts full of hate. That’s just the reality of having an impact. My main take away from the post is that anything worth making will receive its share of critics. As a creator you should be aware of that and be ready to focus on the people you actually bring joy to and who appreciate what you do rather than the haters and take pride in actually moving the needle enough to be reacted on.
- mattacular 3y ago> In German there is the saying: Wer macht, hat recht which translates to who makes is right. Closest thing in English that I could think of: history is written by the winners. Similar concept.
- ncarroll 3y agoI'm not sure that it is really similar. I would translate "Wer macht hat recht" to something more like "the creator knows best" or "the creator gets to choose". "History is written by the winners." has, I think a less creative context. Perhaps because history is what is written after wars, conquests and other applications of violence. The word "winners" requires and implies losers. Creation requires neither.
- avgcorrection 3y agoNot similar at all, and an absurd comparison. The former is a value/moral judgement while the latter is an empirical observation about how history is written, and not at all an embrace of such a supposed fact (which would effectively translate to “might makes right”).
- mattacular 3y agoHrmm ok... since mine is so absurd, what's an English equivalent in your mind?
- Karellen 3y ago"Put up or shut up"? Or maybe "patches or GTFO" :-)
- sgtnoodle 3y ago"The customer is always right"?
- ethbr0 3y agoThat's the opposite! :) Which I guess speaks to how consumerist the US as a society is (said as an American). The closest I can come up with is "Those who can, do." (Usually seen with "... Those who can't, teach.")
- account42 3y ago> Complaining is simple, just shut up and do it better. This is an absurd position. We can't all be masters of anything but that doesn't mean we can't recognize flaws. Sure, sometimes there is a good reason for something a novice would perceive as a flaw but just throwing the concept of criticims away entirely and demand that people accept whatever you crap out is ridiculous. Building echo chambers where no one dares to criticize does not help the art at all - that way lies mediocrity. All creators should learn to find value in criticism, especially negative. That doesn't mean that you need to always follow laymen opinions but even things wrongly perceived as faults are perceived as such and you should at least think about why that is and if that means you can do something better rather than ignoring the ignorant plebes. It's also pretty arrogant of you to assume that "consumers" (what a dehumanizing term that is) should care about your constraints at all - especially constraints that are self-imposed. If you are selling something (either for money or for the expectation of time/resouces put in by the user) then your struggles are and imho should be irrelevant - all that matters is how well you fill the need that the user is trying to fill. > In German there is the saying: Wer macht, hat recht which translates to who makes is right. Jeder hat so viel Recht, wie er Macht hat. If people have the means to complain, they have the right to. You can ignore them (unless you depend on them) but others might not.
- Retric 3y agoCriticism has zero inherent value. It’s easy to assume that stuff people like is inherently better, but anything with widespread appeal ends up really bland. You can’t do better than simply ok while making everyone happy. This obviously gives rise to picking an audience, but this idea goes beyond just demographics. There is no greatest book of all time for 12 year old boys only individual preference which doesn’t result in an absolute rank. Commercial art is at best a compromise. No artist is going to inherently prefer exactly what the market wants directly, they only want the indirect things associated with that. Aka money, fame etc.
- account42 3y ago[dead]
- 3y ago
- avgcorrection 3y agoHN superiority complex summarized in one comment. Of course we know nothing about that inflamed moderator. Oh well.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- nsplayer 3y agoWas für eine Überraschung, ein arroganter Deutscher, der nie Natural-Selection gespielt hat, hält einen Vortrag. Hier geht es um die Gemeinschaft des Spiels, nicht um das Spiel selbst. Dieser Mann hat das Spiel nicht programmiert, nur eine kleine Ergänzung zu einer Ergänzung.
- thrdbndndn 3y agoI'm at the opposite: I think people have the right to complain about anything, especially when they're the target audience (in this case, the game player). This doesn't change even if the product is free. I do think they should stay polite and if the author isn't willing to change (for either objective or subjective reasons), move on.
- onion2k 3y agoI think people have the right to complain about anything, especially when they're the target audience (in this case, the game player). What people do not have any right, or entitlement, to is agreement from the person they're complaining to. People are allowed to dismiss a complaint and not do anything about it, no matter how unhappy the complainant might be about it. You have no right to demand someone does something; you can only inform them that you're not happy about the status quo.
- moi2388 3y agoYea I do have the right to demand that, but you have the right to ignore my demands.
- brookst 3y agoI think it's the semantics of "demand." To me, that connotes a claim of control or power or moral authority. I have a right to complain that it's raining. And I have the free speech right to say "I demand it stop raining". But I have no right to come to you and demand that you make the rain stop, because that implies a claim on you that I do not have.
- _whiteCaps_ 3y agoOh boy, that reminded me of a flame war that started when someone wrote in English, "I demand ..." when they were really just _asking_ for further details about something. They woke up the next morning to find a thread dozens of messages long of people arguing back and forth about whether this person was rude or not. Once they explained that French was their native language and how they would write that sentence in French, things eventually calmed down.
- geoffbp 3y agoSometimes a good way to get feedback is to listen to who is complaining
- roenxi 3y agoThere are other things at play here. It is important to understand that the average human is unbelievably limited and delicate (in the modern era, they don't understand any of the systems that sustain their lifestyle and have skills of only marginal use). There are multiple systems in place to take all these delicate humans and set them up to live comfortable lives. The first layer is the makers, but after that there are a couple of layers of assessors and distributors before ideas and products hit the masses. For someone in a community that makes things, criticism isn't so useful. In the other layers that are there to work out what ordinary people should do armchair criticism is a lot more useful. Still not very impressive, but more useful. The armchair critics aren't at all interested in making things. Their self-appointed role isn't to make things. They are part of a community that generates chatter to help guide the conversation of the people who actually decide what should happen at the mass-market level.
- expertentipp 3y ago> Wer macht, hat recht which translates to who makes is right. Complaining is simple, just shut up and do it better. Ain't dealing with an avalanche of Abmahnung, and ain't going to shut up either.
- mbwgh 3y ago> In German there is the saying: Wer macht, hat recht which translates to who makes is right. Complaining is simple, just shut up and do it better. There's unfortunately also the saying "Nicht geschimpft ist genug gelobt", i.e. something like "Not being scolded is enough compliments". If things work, they are taken for granted and some people only speak up if they are irritated. Which of course leads to a biased perception of how satisfied the people on average really are with your work. Last week I wrote an email to an author to a blog I have been following for a year or so. Just wanted to let him know his work was appreciated and I hope he continues writing. He replied and told me this little gesture made his day. So I guess I should do more of that.