Is second-order enshittification a thing?

 
Enshittifcation, as a term popularized by Cory Doctrow, has for many become a catch-all term for things generally getting worse. I've found it useful (unsurprising if you know me) to think about it in two categories.
There's the popular definition of how very large, dominant platforms change [to get worse] over time as business/organizational priorities change.

I think there's a second-order version of this that follows as a response.

I'd sum it up like this:

"If [big company] doesn't have to focus on quality, we can cut corners there too."

What happens when "everyone" takes this approach is that things get continually worse. Not all at once and not always in the immediately obvious ways. More in the million paper cuts way.

From a software perspective, it's the increasing number of small bugs that no one seems to care about fixing. This teaches people to not bother reporting them. After all, "what's the point? They're not going to fix it even if I [you] do report it."

With fewer known or reported bugs, the company thinks everything is fine, or worse still, thinks skipping on quality is an approach that works.

And a self-reinforcing cycle continues.

I prefer to think of it another way.

Software exists to help people and to make their lives "better". This could be in one or in many ways.

When people are constantly being interrupted, frustrated, and disappointed by the software they use, it's very hard to argue that it is making them better, happier, or more productive.

This is part of the reason I think that QA, customer service, and fixing bugs are among the most important things that those in software development can focus on.

With AI making copying software easier, it's focusing on how it relates to people that can be the real differentiator. 

Yes, AI may mean you can vibe code a copy of something that exists, but does it include support for all the non-obvious edge cases? Do you even know all the features that exist in what's being copied? How (and?) will you handle any bug reports?

Yes, building software can be fun for you, but high-quality software that works reliably benefits many more people and, in a small way at least, makes the world a better place.

And this can also lead to mediocrity

A small company tries to compete with a large one. They try to do everything because that's what the large company (or their software) does. They try hard, but as they're stretching themselves so thin, everything suffers. "Never mind", they say, "at least we're trying our best." But, for what? Who benefits? The company's staff exhaust themselves producing a mediocre product, and it's no better than the alternatives.
Trying to compete with a large company and basing goals on the perceived [low] standards of another company doesn't produce a great product, happy customers, or happy staff.

_This was written many months before posting--to avoid anyone thinking I'm responding to a single person, company or incident_

Decoding feedback - 4/5 stars

I recently saw this software review being shared on Twitter.

THIS APP HAS EVERYTHING I COULD WANT but it does more than I need. 4/5 stars

The implication was that if it does everything that they want the reviewer should have given it 5 stars.

This sat in my mind for a while and the response I was building became too long for Twitter so I'm posting it here.

Part of the job of a developer and any business owner is to understand what customers (or users) want. Often you have to try and work this out for yourself. If you're fortunate they'll tell you what they think or what they think they want. The trick of being a good business owner, or product manager, or customer relations person, or developer working from a spec is being able to take what is said and working out what is meant.

Reviews are great feedback. Let's see what the person who left the above review might be telling us. With no more context, we have to guess at some of it but let's what they might be saying as an exercise in trying to understand the user and identify ways of improving a product.

• This app does all they want. It's important to recognize that we're in a positive place and we want to make it even better. Don't start by being defensive and critical of what is mostly positive feedback. This is a learning opportunity.
• But they don't think it's perfect. The opportunity for improvement.
• Doing more than they need may be a problem. The challenge here is finding out why this is the case.
• Maybe there are so many features, options, and pieces of functionality it's hard to get to the ones they want.
• Maybe the features they want are at the bottom of or hidden in, a long list that the person has to search through each time.
• Maybe the terms the app uses aren't the ones the person uses and so they are forced to remember (or figure out--through trial and error) the translations each time they use the app.
• Maybe it's hard to do the things that they want, even though they are possible.
• Maybe they have to navigate through multiple pages/sections/menus to get to the functionality they want.
• Maybe the app has ways around the issue they're encountering but they don't know how and so it's just an education issue.

So, what could be done about this?

• If possible, seek clarification.
• Consolidate this feedback with what others are saying.
• Address the concerns once it's known what they are.
  My guess is that the ability to mark options as favorites or maintain a recently used list will help but it's worth exploring the possible other issues highlighted above to see if they're issues too.

HT

Amazon are willing to pay £5 for details of my Facebook friends

<JustWondering>
I got this email last week:

Glossing over the fact they ignore our 16+ year relationship and can only address me as "Amazon.co.uk Customer".
I don't think I can recall another business being so transparent about how much access to my Facebook data is worth.

Exactly what data?
We'll, here's what they want to know:

So, that's my details, plus my friends details, their birthday's and their likes.

Wow. At the very least, Amazon think they can make more than £5 extra in profit by being able to remind me that my friend has an upcoming birthday and suggesting things I can buy for them as a gift.
Plus many more things as well no doubt.

Yes, there's a potential benefit of potentially improving relationships by helping make sure I don't forget a birthday and making it easier for me to give (send?) them an appropriate gift based on their likes.
However:

• Do I really need yet another service sending me emails about peoples upcoming birthdays?
• Am I really likely to need the present suggestions for my close friends?
• Based on Amazon's ability to mine large amounts of data, what will be the long term consequence of me giving them this Facebook access?
• Is £5 really enough to get lots of people to sign up to this? If not, then I wonder how much would be?
• Do people look at an offer like this and think about the data security implications? Or do they just think "free money"?

</JustWondering>

Visual design is nothing without UX design

This is a break from my usual, more technical posts, indulge me for a moment.

So, I was looking at Etsy on one of my Android tablets as I'd remembered it being highlighted as an example of an extremely well designed app. What follows is my experience as a first time user.

• I opened the app fine and was immediately shown trending content. Good, no barrier to use, no awkward tutorials and no unnecessary sign up/registration before it was needed.
• I eventually came across something that I thought would make a good present and was quite cheap (at just £12.43). I decided to mark it as a favourite so I could come back to it later if I did decide I wanted to buy it. The empty heart shaped in the top corner looked just the thing I needed.
• Tapping on the heart prompted me to sign in or register. As I was only just starting to engage with the app and its content it would have been nice to save my favourites locally on that device without the need to first register. Oh well.
• During registration one of the required fields was for "Email or Username". As I started to enter my email address I thought it odd that the @ symbol wasn't promoted on the keyboard. Never mind I thought and entered my email address only to be told that I'd entered illegal characters for that field. :( I therefore couldn't enter my email address here (I'd already included it in the "email" field anyway so just chose a username. Why make me choose a username? All the ones I'd usually use had already been taken so I'll probably forget it anyway.
• After registering and marking the item as a favourite I returned to the trending list and continued to browse. As I did so I noticed that the items I was now scrolling to had prices listed in USD, while previously they'd been in GBP. I scrolled back up and there was a definite change slightly after the item I had been looking at while registering. Having a suspicion what had happened I went looking for the app settings. There I found a setting for currency that was set to USD and not the "Device default" of GBP. It seems that after registering on a device configured for "English (UK)", being used in England (if they done a geo-IP lookup) and after registering with an email address that has a ".co.uk" domain they thought to change my currency setting to USD. How thoughtful?
• So, after a bit more browsing I decided I would purchase the item I had looked at earlier. The item could be personalised so I looked how this was specified and was told it was done as part of the checkout process. So off I went to pay.
• At the checkout everything had switched again to USD, presumably because I was buying from a US retailer but it would be good to have this made clear to me.
• I chose PayPal as an option (nice to see on a mobile device as it meant I didn't have to enter as many details-card, address, etc.) And completed my purchase.
• At this point I realised I hadn't been given personalisation options. Never mind, I'll just contact the seller and send them the details. I found how to do this easily but I couldn't send the message. It seems that you can't contact the person an order has been placed with until my email address had been confirmed. Yes, they'll take my money and place my order without verifying my email address, but ask a question about the purchase I've made. That's obviously a no no. They'd made access to email an artificial barrier to a secondary task. in this instance this was particularly frustrating as I didn't have access to the email account I'd registered with on the device I was using. (Admittedly I use a wide array of devices way in excess of what normal people do and I don't keep all my email accounts configured on all devices. - As it becomes more common for people to use a wider array of devices in their lives expect this to be a bigger issue.)
• Eventually I got everything sorted and even had email acknowledgement that my order had shipped later the same day.

So what about the app overall?

Technically it's a good app: interesting content, no bugs or performance issues that I could see. Just the need for a bit of refinement.

Sadly, we're still in a position where the best apps aren't truly amazing.

Visually, yes it's a good looking app with lots of rich engraving visual content. My experience with using it through was not as good as it could (should?) have been.

Remember, "design" is too broad a word with too many meanings to be helpful on its own. What something does and how it is to use is almost always more important than how it looks.

If the customer/user doesn't understand: it's your fault, not their problem

I remember, a few years ago, a client was in the office of the company I was working for at the time and they were showing off the promotional flyers they'd printed and were busy distributing to potential customers.

After they'd handed us copies they remarked that the people they were trying to reach just "didn't get it". They were handing out all this information about how clever the technicalities of the system were and all the things it would now enable them to do but everyone they spoke to just asked about price (which wasn't mentioned on the flyer).
As far as their potential users were concerned, all they were interested in was price. All the other whizz-bang features were of no interest to them. The company in question had wasted a lot of time money and effort in trying to tell people about what they were offering but it wasn’t anything their potential customers were interested in.

So what does this have to do with building phone apps?

I think it demonstrates two areas where app developers often make mistakes. They build an app without understanding their desired and potential market and they don't make their value proposition clear. 




Understand your market

If you're not making something people want or that is different from an alternative in a way that is “better” from the users perspective, you’ll find making sales hard.

This means:
- thinking before building an app
- building something that there is a market for. (Yes, this means going and doing some research first.)
- not just building it because you can or it's technically possible

It’s easier to sell something if you build what people want than it is to build what you want and then try and persuade people to buy it.





Make your value proposition clear

Explain what your application does and how that will help, benefit and provide value to the user. This will enable them to make an informed decision about purchasing the application and ultimately encourage them to do so.
Of course, this may mean that you have to explain what the application cannot do. Whether this is through decision or technical limitation. By making this clearer before they have the app and are trying to get it to do something it can't you'll make them happier. No, not everyone will read a long description about the capabilities and limitations of the app so you'll need to be smart about how you communicate this.

I think no customer is better than a disappointed one who is complaining and spreading negative word of mouth. Focus on getting the ones you want and the ones who want your app. It'll make everyone happier in the long run.

At the end of the day it comes down to building what will sell and communicating (marketing) clearly. Do this and you'll have more success with your apps.




 

Learning, not moaning.

If you follow me on Twitter you may have noticed that I have a tendency to complain about poor service and badly produced apps quite a bit. In an attempt to be a bit more positive I thought I'd see what I can learn from these issues rather than just moan.

Here's what I've learnt in the last few days.


Issue:
If you have an Orange Broadband account and have set up an online account to look at bills, etc. You'll discover there isn't a way to change your password and if you forget it you have to call a phone number to speak to "tehnical support" and have them tell you it. If you then ask to change the password they will tell you not to. Presumably because it's a non-trivial task for them.

Lesson learned:
Understand security. Make sure "technical staff" understand security. Make it easy to change passwords.


Issue:
When trying to speak to someone at Direct Line I had to go through their automated phone system which presented options I had to select by pressing numbers.

Lesson learned:
Make things easy to navigate and test navigation routes.


Issue:
When trying to log in to a website (mentioning no names), I eventually discovered why my password wasn't working. - It was because I had CAPS LOCK on. But I had no way of seeing this as the entered characters were masked. (The username/email had been saved by the browser so I didn't see the upper case characters being entered there as I didn't have to type anything else.)

Lesson learned:
Indicate if CAPS LOCK is on when the user is entering text which isn't displayed - like with a password entry box when characters are starred out.
Or, write a password checking system which accepts either correctly cased passwords or passwords entered with case inversion. This means storing 2 hashes of the password (& salt) but is only a very small amount of work which could save a lot of frustration for any user who can't see why their password isn't being accepted.
I'm holding off on ignoring case entirely in passwords though. That seems like a step to far and would be more of a compromise in security and invalidate the user's attempts to use a strong password.


Issue:
I just installed some of the apps in Windows Live Essentials but it also installed some of the apps I asked it not to install.

Lesson learned:
Thoroughly test installers!
and, in case this is a dependency issue - be sure to indicate dependencies and other things which must be installed as well, clearly.


Issue:
It took 2 phone calls taking over 25 minutes to stop Orange from taking payments from my account which they should not be - due to a mistake that they made. When this was finally sorted no-one said sorry and I haven't been given anything for the trouble (of them taking payments they weren't due or for the inconvenience and time taken for me to identify the issue and get them to sort it out.).

Lesson learned:
Say sorry and provide compensation (of some appropriate sort) when you make a mistake.


Yes that's a lot of issues for two days but I think about these things a lot because I want to make awesome apps (and services) which don't frustrate the user or contain stupid decisions or do anything apart from make it easy on the user and get out of their way.

"Awesome apps that improve lives"

This is all I want to make: "awesome apps that improve lives"!

But what does this mean?

Let's break it down into 3 parts:

1.    awesome
2.    apps
3.    that improve lives

"Awesome"

• Because mediocraty sucks.
• Because just doing enough isn't enough.
• Because expectations should be exceeded. I want to deliver more than was promised. Not be justifying why someone is getting less.
• Being awesome is easier than you might think. Because so few people do it.
• Hopefully being awesome will get harder.  Hopefully this will be because more people are also making awesome software.

"apps"

• Why apps? (By which I mean software.)
• Because that's what I know and have made, studied and continued to learn about for the last 15+ years.
• A few years ago I did some consultancy for a couple of mobile device manufacturers based on some prior work I had done on evaluating handheld computing devices.  Apart from that I've always focused far more on the 'soft' side of things.

"that improve lives"

What does it mean to "improve lives"?

• To make things easier.
• To make things faster.
• To make things cheaper.
• To make things a pleasure, not a chore.
• To allow people to focus on the important rather than the trivial or mundane.

Simples.

Please [don't (?)] peek at Orange

 

This is a really poor quality photo (taken with my phone) of one of my local orange stores.  As you probably can't tell. The store is currently closed for a refit.  The entire front of the store is covered with black paper.  In large letters it says "hey, no peeking" and then there are some generic numbers you can call for more information.  On the other window (not shown) it says when the store will be reopening and has details of the nearest alternate store.

While I can appreciate that they are trying to have a sense of humour with the message being displayed. The entire store front basically says "go away".  This doesn't strike me as the best things they could have done with what's a potentially very valuable opportunity to engage with potential customers.

Why not take this opportunity to engage with potential new/future customers?
Instead of stopping people from seeing what you're doing why not show them?
Or better still, why not show them something that intrigues, entertains and encourages interest and word of mouth?

Here's what I'd do:
Instead of having paper covering the whole store front, I'd leave gaps and encourge people to look through.
I'd create the gaps at different heights (including very low and very high - deliberately making it harder for everyone to see everything) and behind each I'd have something different.  Behind some I'd have static images, promtions, info, etc.  I'd also have competitions and discounts avaialble on a text to win basis.  Any such prizes would of course be linked to discounts limited to the day of reopening.
But behind certain key gaps I'd have screens and while some may occasionally provide information on when the store will reopen the real value would be in having unique, entertaining footage.  This could be all sorts of things: It could look like the store was completely missing; what if it looked like the store was being filled with something completely ridiculous - animals, water, a ball pool?; it could look like people supposedly doing the refit but who suddenly break into dance.  The only limit would be imagination (oh and cost) but such footage could potentially be reused across multiple store refits and then made available online.

• How many people just walk straight past a store that's closed for refit?
• How many would stop to peek in if they thought they'd get to see something they normally wouldn't?
• If you walked past a store that was obviously closed but had people clammering to peer in at the window, wouldn't you be at least slightly curious yourself?  Admit it, there's a bit of a voyeur in all of us.
• Who's done something like this before? (in the UK?) Don't you think people would talk about it? And want to come and see for themselves?  And at the same time being educated about the reopening and the brand in general.

In that, as Orange, I'd know who had bought a phone there before or lived nearby and was shortly due an upgrade I'd email or SMS them (subject to previously expressed mailing preferences) to let them know a bit about some of the new phones that will be available when the store reopens.  I'd also, obviously, tell them when it would reopen. And I'd tell them to come and have a peek in the window to see what was going on while the refit was going on.

The aim would be to engage with [potential] customers, promote the newly refurbished store and encourage word of mouth that means that when the store reopens more people will be aware of it and be eager to see what has actually changed.

Well, that's what I'd do.

I hope the refit doesn't get rid of the fish tank they used to have.  Disappointinglyt that was often far more interesting than most of the phones there.

Oh and for the record, I've had (among others) a contract with Orange for more than 12 years, but I'm frequently starting to wonder why.

Indicators that a company will provide poor customer service

Found this list, I made earlier in the year, prompted by spending a day talking to companies at exhibition stands at a conference.

No collateral
If they haven't got anything you can take away to remind you about a product, it shows that you aren't doing everything you can to make it easy for me, a potential customer. Why should I think that you treat actual customers any better?

No info on website homepage
So I haven't got anything tangible to remind me of, or provide details about, you or your product.  If that information isn't on your website how am I supposed to learn anything about the product, in my own time, and at my own pace.  Again, you're not making it easy for me.

Poor/no documentation/user guides/ etc.

If you haven't got anything to help users help themselves, why should I think you've got any resources that you can use to help? And if you have, why keep them to yourself?

You have to give them your information to get anything out of them (info/samples/docs/tools)
If you're more interested in getting my contact details than telling me about your product, why would I think that you're interested in anything other than I money, such as providing support if I became a customer?

No published prices
Why are you not publishing your prices? Unless it's because you desperately want my contact details rather than let me determine if your product/service/etc. is in my price range?  Or am I going to see the price and not think it's appropriate unless one of your sales people explains to me why it's not overpriced.  So, why aren't you spending your time making a great product that I can use, understand and see the benefits of?

No support SLA or escalation detailsYou haven't thought how you're going to be able to deal with the issues or questions I may have? and ensure that I get appropriate resolutions in a timely manner?

Not using a system properly?

Can a user not use a system properly?

I can see how they might not use it as it was intended or designed, but properly?

Assuming that properly means the same a correctly. (http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=define%3A+properly)
If a system can be used in a way other than a correct one, doesn't that mean that the program is at best flawed or, at worst, contains errors?

I suspect that this phrase ("not using it properly") is typically used when they mean not as intended.  If that is the case it means that the program is unnecessarily complicated. Doesn't it?

Xobni Setup

This is the last screen on the Xobni installer. A pleasant change from the usual practise of hiding a list of staff names somewhere in an app.

Customer service

"In the business world it's called 'customer service', but really it's just doing Jesus' ministry."

-Mike Riches

Problems escalated from helpdesk

I don't want to be awkward or unreasonable, but if a problem is being escalated from a help desk there is a certain amount of information that I would expect to have been gathered. I'm not just being picky. It saves time in the long run and means that the customer/user gets a better experience.

Information about the caller/customer/user:

• Their name
• The company they work for (possibly)
• How to contact them (phone no, email, etc.)

About the issue:

• Which program?
• Which version?
• What is happening?
• How can it be recreated?
• What were they expecting?
• What steps need to be taken to recreate the issue?
• What has been tried already to address the issue?
• What has changed?
• When did the issue start?
• Does it occur on one, some or all machines?
• Is it a consistent or occasional issue?
• What impact does the issue have on the user(s)?

And probably more besides...

Educating customers

If your customer isn't aware that they have already purchased something from you but have never used it, don't spend time laughing amongst yourselves about them, spend time on how you can make sure that your customers have got what they need and aware how to use it to benefit themselves.
This will make customers happier.

A good tactic?

"There is a lot of configuration that needs to be done. You really
need to [pay us to] get us to configure it for you."

Phenomenal customer service

You cannot provide or foster phenomenal customer service by saying you have it. You can only provide and foster customer service by embedding the customer in your company.