> computer tech isn't special. It's no different, in the grand scheme of things, than petrochemical refining or agriculture. True, however I wonder if people t

> computer tech isn't special. It's no different, in the grand scheme of things, than petrochemical refining or agriculture. True, however I wonder if people think computer tech is simpler because they own some. Ask someone if they understand petro-chemical processing and they'll probably say no, but ask if they understand computers and they might think they know a lot because they use one all the time. They've even had to change some options in a password-protected preferences panel, or use a keyboard shortcut! They can get their phone to sync with their two computers, and it all just works. Tech has (particularly recently) has become common and very simple, and we live now in a time when you can get your granny an iPad with Siri and she can use it. With driving the usability of everything up, we've also been pushing the idea that "it's simple, really! Don't be scared" and that's worked wonders. I get frustrated when a confirmation email takes more than a few seconds to show up in gmail, how ludicrous is that? I got annoyed when skype went blocky and the sound kinda crackled while talking to someone on the other side of the world for free, while on wifi. I caught myself thinking "But you just send the thing from here to there, it's so simple!" and thought about it more. I think that was the point of this article, it's phenomenal complexity hidden behind a fantastically simple interface. A lot of people have poured a huge amount of money into making it feel simpler, Apple are a great example of that. You can talk to your phone and it'll sass you back. I wonder which other fields have this same problem? I know there will be some, because I'll be one of the people thinking it's really simple when it isn't. Maybe medicine? People might think it's complicated for some things but there is a culture of 'Just make the right type of pill, duh'.