> It DOES fucking matter if "the philosophy by which you design a product is friendly or not" when you're trying to build that product in a community (as is the

> It DOES fucking matter if "the philosophy by which you design a product is friendly or not" when you're trying to build that product in a community (as is the case with Gnome 3). He specifically mentions Gnome 3 as his example, and in the dynamics of Open Source communities friendly DOES matter. A lot. Ah the whine of the open source developer who wonders why the average joe finds OSS unusable and impregnable. It doesn't matter if there's a great product at the end of it. If the product is suboptimal then we can all moan about the reasons why. Also worth pointing out that you're misrepresenting his article. He says: > It’s a problem that doesn’t just apply to Gnome 3—though Gnome 3 certainly suffers from it. It’s the problem of the Cult of Design Dictatorship. So either you don't understand his article, or he's applying a generalisation drawn from Gnome3 and then deliberately applying it to the wider world. Which? > Perhaps you could spend "fainting" (sic) I'm obliged to point out, with a sense of delicious irony, that you are using sic incorrectly ;) > and more time in reading and understanding where TFA comes from. I read it and understood it. It's horseshit. > It's not like most designers working in web/software startups are trained professionals, What? Yes, they are. > profficient in the history of design, psychological and cognitive issues, HCI principles and user testing methodologies. A lot are just glorified graphic designers, if that. A lot, or most? > Especially the ones TFA article describes, and which we've all met, are the "I know better" BS types. I guess there's an inherent risk with drawing _massive, sweeping generalisations_ from "I've met some of these". > Also your whole argument is based on the premise of: "if the designer is doing their job properly and working with and for users". Actually my argument is better summarised as: 1. If a designer is doing their job properly, then the characteristics described in the original article all hold true, but the outcome is successful so nobody cares. 2. The point laboured in the article is, essentially, that design is not a democracy and you should "go home" if you don't like a product. I counter that this is a platitude: it could be true of any product ever made. > Just another pedantic correction of a comment made in jest that was not supposed to be taken literally. Not to mention he doesn't say he's retired at all. "spends his days". It's an unfair characterisation made in support of a tawdry argument which boils down to a bunch of plattitudes > He talks of the same "FUCK" (sic) that 37 Signals themselves admit (and are proud of). That they make opinionated products, and that if somebody isn't pleased with them, so be it. My point was: But so what? Every single piece of software is made with opinion behind it. If you don't like it you can choose another piece of software. That's true of everything from bottled water to delivery pizza. Who gives a shit? It's not worth pointing out.