The other day, I watched as a customer walked into a restaurant asking for his order. The restaurant hadn't received the order, however, and the man became upset. He admitted that he's not great with technology, and he complained that this always seems to happen with the restaurant's third-party ordering system. When it does happen, he gets no confirmation email and his card is not charged.

The next day, someone in an online class expressed confusion about how to meet their coach for a scheduled appointment, but the coach had no appointment on their calendar. Similarly, years earlier, a relative told me they had ordered an Uber, but it never showed up.

In all of these cases, I'm almost certain the users did not click the final button labeled Order, Confirm, Submit, or similar. (The restaurant owner blamed browser cookies, but that has nothing to do with it.)

I can hardly blame these users, though. I once showed up to a hotel, thinking I had booked a room with them, only to find that they had no reservation under my name. I looked for the confirmation email, and sure enough, it didn't exist! I needed to quickly book with some rinky-dink place across the street. I had made the same mistake!

This isn't about tech literacy or intelligence; it's about bad user interface design. A depressing amount of software ignores the basic rules of usable design. In this case, what looks like a confirmation screen (i.e., “your order has been placed”) may actually be a confirm screen (i.e., “tell us that you're sure”). When users are on those screens, their loci of attention may be on the order details rather than the user interface. They want to know that the flight time is correct. They want to know that the price is correct. They may not be paying attention to the Confirm button, which is probably offscreen anyway. They may not be looking at the tiny text at the top which reads, “Please review this information before booking your flight.” They are focused on something else, which may explain why they miss context clues in the periphery. Jef Raskin discusses this at length in his book, The Humane Interface.

So before leaving an app, website, or other ordering system, be sure to confirm, confirm, and confirm again. Slow down. Read carefully. Scroll. Zoom in and out. Make sure there's nothing else you need to do. A few seconds of prudence may prevent lots of frustration later.

#Life #SoftwareDevelopment #Tech #TechTips

It is really true what philosophy tells us, that life must be understood backwards. But with this, one forgets the second proposition, that it must be lived forwards. A proposition which, the more it is subjected to careful thought, the more it ends up concluding precisely that life at any given moment cannot really ever be fully understood; exactly because there is no single moment where time stops completely in order for me to take position [to do this]: going backwards.

—Søren Kierkegaard, as translated by Palle Jorgensen

This reminds me of what Steve Jobs said in his 2005 Stanford Commencement Address: “You can't connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards.” Based on the stories I've heard of Jobs, I wouldn't be surprised if he knew he was borrowing from Kierkegaard.

#Favorites #Life #Quotes

This fairly recent obsession with metrics in the workplace is driving companies insane.

A while back, I watched a video about all the ways hotels are trying to save money by, among other things, eliminating storage space, removing desks, pressuring guests to work at the bar, where those guests can spend more money, and making the in-room bathrooms less private. These changes are, of course, driven by metrics like “GSS” and “ITR,” whatever the f@*k those are.

Is there a kernel of truth to all of this? Sure. Aloft Hotels are cozy, and they seem to follow this playbook. I didn't mind staying in one when I was stuck in San Francisco for one night more than ten years ago. Would I want to stay in one of their rooms during a business trip or anything else lasting more than a couple of days? Hell no. I'd like a desk and somewhere to put my clothes. (I know, I'm so needy. I travel with clothes.)

Metrics are fine, sometimes, when their use is limited and their shortcomings are genuinely appreciated. Taking them too seriously and letting them make the decisions, however, is a recipe for disaster. Hard questions demand more thoughtfulness than that. “GSS” and “ITR” are meaningful until they aren't, and nobody is going to find solace in those abbreviations when generations of potential customers steer clear of your business because they actually want something good.

Sadly, I don't think most businesses think that far ahead.

Show me the metric which proves that your business isn't taking a massive risk by ignoring common sense. Until then, I don't care about “the numbers.”

#Life #SoftwareDevelopment #Tech

The video If TikTok Were Honest is surprisingly good. It does a great job of explaining the harms of social media in general and the harms of TikTok in particular.

Say you're into politics. [TikTok] will push you further and further into the extreme edges of whatever side you're on. Why? Because outrage and confirmation bias keeps you glued to your screen! This isn't just bad for your worldview, it's bad for society. Echo chambers breed division. They make people more certain they're right, more hostile to differing opinions, and less likely to engage in actual conversation.

—If TikTok Were Honest

Let's not gloss over the reminder that this is bad for your worldview. That's one of my biggest problems with social media. In making people more extreme and less aware of differing opinions, their persuasive ability weakens and they become counterproductive in their activism. To add insult to injury, they sometimes actually come to think of themselves as the sacred protectors of their various causes. Give me a break.

Don't leave social media because I told you to. Leave social media because it's making you hurt the people you're trying to help.

#Life #Maxims #SocialMedia #Tech

I heard this phrase recently, in a conversation where one person was trying to get through to another person who was being uncooperative. I think it's a great line, and I'm going to try to remember it for the future.

“I can explain it for you, but I can't understand it for you.”

The problem is, that's pretty curt. I don't think most people would be able to really hear that, and I think we have a responsibility to make sure our words are heard. If we know our words won't be heard, what's the point of speaking at all? Is it to feel better about ourselves? It shouldn't be, in my opinion. We have enough of that already.

For that reason, I might try something kinder first when talking with an ornery person. In the past, I've used the following, and people seem to take it well.

“I'm sorry that's not the answer you want, but that's my answer.”

Substitute the word “answer” for “request,” “advice,” or any other word as needed.

#Life #Maxims #Quotes

I've come to feel that any belief, philosophy, or endeavor taken too seriously causes extreme harm. The most benevolent religious commitments taken to the extreme go completely off the rails, as do the most reasonable philosophies taken to their furthest logical conclusions. Even attempting to do no harm perfectly is likely to do immense harm, albeit in some unexpected way.

I'm self-conscious that it's taken me so long to see this, because it seems so obvious now. It only became clear after learning a bit about Nietzsche's criticism of philosophical stoicism, including that it leads adherents to act callously toward others and forego the most important challenges in life. I haven't noticed stoicism encouraging that kind of attitude, but when taken to its extreme, perhaps it does! That's one more reason for me to proceed with relative caution, rather than thoughtlessly adopting the worst of that worldview. Learning more about cults, in particular the Heaven's Gate UFO suicide cult, also helped me see this. Cult members, even those who commit terrible acts—especially those who commit terrible acts!—are usually not evil or stupid. In fact, they're often very intelligent and they almost always have the best intentions. They're just extremely committed to a bad idea. (That's true of members, anyway. Many cult leaders are so deranged that they hurt others even when they know better. Others cult leaders are true believers. Some are both. I suspect most cult leaders fail to see a meaningful difference fact and fiction at all; they weave between the two like an interpretive dancer—everything is true, nothing is true, up is down, accountants are lizard people, whatever. It's all good.)

If you find yourself in the 99^th percentile of some endeavor, stop, slow down, and re-evaluate. A little common sense goes a long way, and at that high level of attainment, that's what you need most.

#Favorites #Life #Maxims

In August, in an effort to lose weight, improve my health, and learn to cook, I took the Jumpstart class with the Rochester Lifestyle Medicine Institute. Any attendee who participates fully—measuring changes in their health, attending meetings, etc.—is allowed one free retake within 12 months. I'll be beginning that retake on Monday. I'm grateful for the opportunity, because although I learned a lot and developed good habits the first time around, I got off-track with Kika's passing and the holidays. I try not to make excuses, though. I didn't want that change enough. I didn't want it enough to overcome those challenges, anyway. I hope that the retake helps me to rebuild those habits and stick with them.

The RLMI recommends a whole-food plant-based diet. I've been vegan since the summer of 2011 for ethical reasons, but over those years, I became a junk food vegan. There's plenty of highly-processed vegan food out there, full of sugar and salt and fat, and it hasn't served me well. Although I'm not one of those people who thinks any diet can work miracles, curing cancer or some such thing, I do think eating more real food from the earth is probably better for everyone. This program helps participants learn how to do that. (If you do believe a certain diet can work miracles and cure cancer, that's fine, but please don't rely on that at the exclusion of modern medical treatment. It won't work.)

Although I had followed other diets in the past, some very successfully, taking the course in August opened my eyes, for the first time, to how terrible most grocery store food is. Most of those items with big, bright logos, fun packaging, and exciting new flavors are filled with stuff that nobody needs. I'm not even talking about complex chemicals which have difficult-to-pronounce names—those things can be found in bananas, too. I'm talking about the heaps of salt and oil and sugar these brands pack their foods with to make them as delicious (and as unhealthy) as possible.

Since then, I've been struggling to come up with a term for this kind of food. Everyone knows the term junk food, of course, but that doesn't quite describe the food I'm talking about. Many people consider ice cream to be junk food, for example, but not oatmeal that's unnecessarily packed with sugar. I think we need a term for the latter.

After lots of thinking, I finally came up with one: funhouse food. If it has bright colors, a bold name, a cartoon character, fun packaging, or exciting new flavors, if it's loaded with salt or sugar or fat—if it's too much fun—it's funhouse food.

May I endeavor harder and harder to avoid it.

#Life #Maxims

“Humor is just another defense against the universe.”

—Mel Brooks

#Life #Quotes

I know many people who use social media only to follow businesses they care about, so that they can hear about specials, promotions, events, and changes to hours. It's true that some businesses don't update their websites or provide newsletters, so I can understand the appeal of using social media to follow them. The situation seems to be getting better, though, with more and more businesses maintaining a healthy online presence outside of the big, centralized antisocial platforms.

I don't want to be too cynical, but using social media for this purpose does seem like opt-in advertising on some level. It's too bad that many of these users will also be manipulated into liking, commenting, buying, sharing, following, radicalizing, and you know, dismantling democracy.

#Life #SocialMedia #Tech

This has to be one of the strangest developments I've noticed in online communication recently—and yes, sadly, the real world, as if there were any difference.

At some point, it apparently became fashionable to slap the label narcissist on anyone who has behaved badly, as well as many people who haven't. Someone's ex is a narcissist. That one's boss is a narcissist. Everyone's parents are narcissists. What in the world is inspiring people to talk like this? Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) does exist, yes, and there may be some very conspicuous examples of it in public life, although I'm not qualified to diagnose anyone. Still, it's a minority disorder. The Cleveland Clinic reports that NPD affects around 0.5% to 5% of Americans. Clearly, most people who behave badly from time to time do not qualify for a diagnosis. Moreover, mental illnesses like anxiety and depression are far more common.

Yes, sometimes people treat others badly because they are narcissists, but others are unkind due to their depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, addiction, or one of the dozens of other psychological afflictions that cause so much pain. In most cases—not all, but most—I'm sure those suffering with these ailments endure much more agony than the people around them. Of course, that's assuming the target of the “narcissist” label is even clinically unwell. Maybe your boss just wants to further their own goals at the exclusion of yours. That's not narcissism. That's not mental illness. That's just corporate life. (I would argue that any manager pursuing their own goals at the exclusion of yours is a bad manager, but that doesn't make them a narcissist.)

Language evolves, and I suppose people can use the term narcissist to mean brute, if they choose. The dictionary wasn't handed down from the heavens, unchangeable. I just worry that being so sloppy with terminology unfairly demonizes the vast majority of mental illnesses that inspire unusual behavior for other reasons. I also think it can suggest a degree of intent that simply doesn't exist. Maybe that person at the convention shouted at you because they struggle with anger or because they never learned how disagree respectfully, not because they want to feel superior to you.

I do wonder—and this is pretty speculative—whether some people are so cavalier with the term narcissist because they want to deflect attention away from their own narcissism of a different kind. I'm not talking about clinical narcissism, the type that seriously harms oneself and others, but rather more ordinary narcissism, the kind that leads one to believe that anyone actually cares about their status updates. I think it's plausible that social media does foster some amount of casual, everyday narcissism. Could it be that people throw the term around because they're uncomfortable facing their own shrouded narcissism of a different kind?

Instead of throwing labels around, maybe we should spend more time looking in the mirror—in a healthy way. I will try to do the same.

#Life #SocialMedia #Tech