I recently installed a new printer on my system. Now, before you have an “OK, Boomer” knee-jerk reaction – I am a fairly tech-savvy user. I am not an IT professional, but have used computers literally since the 1970s and have kept up with the tech enough to be a confident user. I was therefore frustrated when the experience was…less than enjoyable. I was lured into installing the printer via the app. I falsely assumed that such apps serve the same function that “wizards” (remember those) did in the past, walking you effortlessly through the installation process. I also have had the experience of just plugging a printer into a USB port and having it automatically be recognized, installed, and then function just fine.
It’s been a while since I needed a new printer (I don’t use them much anymore, but I do occasionally need to print something), so I was surprised and frustrated at how long and complicated the process was. I felt I was entering in the same information multiple times, looking up numbers, following QR codes, and answering ambiguous questions. I got it to work, but it took up a far bigger chunk of my life and my mental resources than I was happy with. I later learned that the app is not there to make my life easier, but to lock me in as a customer to upsell me more stuff.
This is not an isolated incident. Again – I am trying really hard not to become an old curmudgeon. I am trying to be objective. But I do think that as one gets older, you can more easily see patterns, and your tolerance for recurrent incompetence and stupidity fades away. As a computer user, I lived through the early years of IRQ settings, manually installing drivers, and compatibility nightmares. But I was a somewhat early adopter and I pushed the limit with upgrades, so I put up with it. Then the industry evolved, with helpful wizards, then plug-and-play, then universal connectors. I did not fully realize, however, that we were past peak-convenience. It’s still much better than in the early days, and you can still have a good user experience, but there seems to be increasing unnecessary complexity, bloatware, and simply horrible user interfaces. I am constantly fending off attempts at sending me push notifications, gathering my data, solicitation for in-app purchases, and intrusive ads. Forget about spam and scams, which are a daily nuisance. Yeah, I know there are ways to handle such things – but that is still my point. It’s all on me, and it’s a constantly evolving landscape.
These issues are not limited to the computing industry, although computers, software, and connectivity are increasingly embedded in other aspects of our lives. I drive an EV, which basically means my car is a computer on wheels. At work (before I retired) I interfaced more with the EMR than with patients (or so it seemed – but this is increasingly true for many doctors). My TV is a computer, as is my picture frame. It’s also getting increasingly difficult just to live your life without interacting online. Last night I ordered dinner online, it was way too expensive, and they screwed up my order. I almost exclusively shop online. Many of my social interactions are online. My current job is 95% online.
To be fair, all of this has brought incredible convenience and efficiency. I would not want to go back to a world prior to online shopping, GPS, and smartphones. I just wish it all didn’t suck as much as it does. Why do so many things have to suck?
I don’t have any inside information, but I do speak to a lot of people and have been paying attention. I think there are a number of reasons. One is that – things are hard, and most people (by definition) are mediocre. We tend to get spoiled when we have good user experiences, and that becomes our baseline expectation going forward. Then every mediocre interaction is annoying. Once I have an experience with a really good user interface, for example, then I lose all tolerance for shitty user interfaces. Why can’t they be like this other one?
Another huge factor is economics. Excellence costs money, and often suckiness is a deliberate economic choice. A software company, for example, can choose not to hire user interface and user experience experts to improve their product, because it costs money. It may also delay release, which costs money. Producers also have to make financial choices. I face these choices myself – do I put ads in my podcast? This will reduce the user experience, but I have to pay for all that bandwidth they are using and all the person-hours it takes to produce. But this can be a slippery slope – how many ads do you put in your software, how intrusive or annoying are they, do you spam people to get more users, do you gather data to sell to third parties, etc.
Then there is the “AI slop” problem, which is not limited to AI but this is now the new poster-child for this phenomenon. It’s simply easier to produce lots of mediocre crap than anything high quality. Quality is therefore like a pyramid, and will always be dominated by the crap closer to the bottom.
Finally I think there is a cultural and institutional effect. We will get as much crap as we tolerate. Ultimately that is probably what most companies are titrating for – how much crap will our customers tolerate? Again, this puts a lot of burden on the consumer, but we do share the responsibility for patronizing quality and not things that suck. But this alone will never be enough, because marketers will just get better and dressing up things that suck as things that have quality, or hiding the suckiness. They will find new ways to make things suck. This is why we need institutional, cultural, industry, and regulatory standards. They need to share the burden too. We need them to create responsive feedback loops so there is some self-correction in the system. We need accountability, transparency, and real options so that consumers can actually make choices in their own interests.
All these good things exist, it’s mainly a matter of balance. It does feel as if the balance of power has shifted toward suckiness, and we need to find ways to find a better equilibrium.
