Feedback to the Dot story

[Aaron J. Seigo]

On Thursday, September 5, 2013 14:38:40 Thomas Pfeiffer wrote:
> On 05.09.2013 13:30, Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> > so what do we do? wait until there are only tasks that a majority of
> > random
> > test subjects do well on?
> 
> Do you think the tasks for the test were picked randomly? 

No, and that isn’t what I wrote, either.

> Most of the
> tasks in the test are essential for working with what sets Plasma Active
> apart from other OSes (like adding things to Activities, tagging stuff
> in Files or using SLC). It's not the first time I set up a usability test.

I am not suggesting you are doing a poor job with the testing. 

What I’m suggesting is that:

* there will always be tests that are deemed vital which will fail, and yet 
the product can still be a success (and loved!) in the market. That’s why I 
keep pointing to Android .. it is not a great technology product in many ways 
and *it doesn’t matter*.

* The usability testing highlights what can and needs to be improved, yet a 
minimum baseline of utility sits below that. We have achieved that.

> before releasing a product. And in every company I've worked with,
> people not being able to finish important tasks (or having big problems
> along the way) results in a red light, forcing the product team to do
> another iteration before release.

And yet Android keeps making releases. Maybe you should go tell Samsung and 
Google how they are doing it all wrong.

> It's not my call, but it isn't yours, either.

Yes, Thomas, it is my call in this case.

We all provide input, even across boundaries of expertise, but this is not a 
democracy. It isn’t a dictatorship, either. It is a participation based 
meritocracy within which we have different roles and responsibilities within 
the over all effort.

This particular matter is not your responsibility.

Nobody micromanages your usability testing, guideline creation or your work on 
bugs.kde.org for PA. People provide input, but you have a very free hand in 
these things. Please show others the same consideration.

> >> And since we target early adopters
> >> and devs, why do we call it "polished product”?
> > 
> > we target early adopters and devs because there are no devices that it
> > comes pre-installed on.
> 
> Yet I have heard several times things along the lines of "The people we
> target with PA4 will be fine with that", which translates to me as "We
> assume the target audience of this release to have above-average
> computer skills".

Let’s assume your translation of that is correct: 

Can’t we have a polished product for people with above-average computer 
skills?

It’s so bizarre to be discussing why we are targeting early adopters and 
developers when we have a product that needs adoption (by which definition all 
people who pick it up are therefore early adoption) and developers (because we 
would like to see more applications, e.g.). The reason why we are targetting 
those people is self -evident. 

And yet.. this discussion about whether the product is ready for use or not. 
Which is something else entirely.

Our current target audience makes sense given our *usage position* NOT the 
quality of the product.

The quality of the product can not able to be determined by who the target 
audience is, either.

What I’m trying to get across here is that this discussion is bordering on the 
absurd, which is why I’d really, really appreciate on both a teammate and a 
personal level if you could somehow find a way to just edit this one aspect of 
your personal opinion related to release communication.

> I consider both Simon and KTp pretty successful, despite their making
> clear that they are not "1.0" yet.

given their level of usage and the level of awareness of either of these 
products in the user base i have to disagree. even within KDE’ existing user 
base they struggle with awareness and usage. the world beyond our borders is 
utterly unaware of them.

are they nice products? yes.

are they successful in terms of usage? not really.

are they successful in terms of getting more developer involvement? not 
particularly.

so i don’t see these products as a model to follow when the goal is to 
increase usage and developer involvement.

you want to know what does have growing usage and developer involvement? 
Ubuntu Touch. it is an inferior product in numerous ways relative to Plasma 
Active, but Canonical is quite happy to talk about its positives and let those 
who like those positives come.

we’re so often busy telling people to stay away, it’s no wonder something as 
great as Simon continues to struggle for awareness and usage. 

frankly, i’m tired of this needlessly and negatively affecting projects i’m 
involved in that include KDE in some fashion.

please, let’s do our technical work here and let people who actually know how 
to communicate with the public do so. 

i mean: how annoying would it be if the promo team tried to tell us that 
they’d now be setting the feature set for future releases because they feel 
they can do a better job of that? yet we, on the technical side, figure we know 
so goddamned much about everything under heaven and earth that should also be 
directing how things are communicated to the public.

> > why? because we’ve pointed out what it does not do well in an attempt to
> > over our ass instead of highlighting what it does do well and focusing
> > people on that.
> 
> I know this list is publicly readable, but do you think what's written
> on this list directly affects public opinion?

if affects the opinion, morale and involvement of people here on this list. it 
affects how people are able to do their job when presenting our efforts to the 
world beyond this mailing list.

so yes, i do think what is written here affects public opinion.

public opinion is an extension of what we allow ourselves to communicate, and 
that is an extension of how we allow ourselves to perceive our efforts and each 
other.

> >> I don't mean to say that we did bad work, because we didn't. We did
> >> great work, but we still have more great work to do before we have a
> >> "polished product". PA4 is great, but still very "rough" in a whole lot
> >> of ways.
> > 
> > shall i list all the bugs i run into on a daily basis on my (not very old)
> > Android phone?
> > 
> > shall i share the pain of watching my brother-in-law use his brand new
> > top-of- the-line Android phone while he complains about this or that as
> > he fiddles about with it?
> > 
> > you are trying to live in a world of perfection that doesn’t exist, and
> > that mindset is an existential threat to the  project.
> 
> I pointed out why I would not consider PA4 a polished product. I did not
> write a blog post about PA4 being bad or anything.

i didn’t say you did.

please: try to understand what i’m writing here: you feel we shouldn’t say it 
is a polished product because there are problems with it that we can identify. 
i’m saying that the polished products that are already on the market also have 
problems, often of similar magnitude, in far greater in number (though mostly 
because they are more featureful). additionally, i’m saying that key parts of 
PA are mature enough to start speaking in language that will allow people to 
start trying it and using it.

we can publicly decry with self-righteousness how non-ready our software is 
and it will never, ever, ever be successful.

we can instead truthfully represent ourselves but without shame and then this 
project stands a chance of success in the market.

> I have different standards for "polished" than you. That's fine with me,
> but I don't think that means I'll have to shut up and keep my standard
> for myself.

sometimes when you work in teams with different opinions, we end up having to 
withhold our disagreement with others in their area of responsibility.

there are things i disagree with in various KDE project efforts i’m involved 
with. i discuss them openly, and when a conclusion has been reached i try to 
respect that conclusion even when i don’t agree with it. what i don’t do is 
keep bringing it up every single time i see the topic arise.

i expect the same from you and others on this team. otherwise we devolve into 
repeated debate on the things we don’t agree on, neglecting the things we do 
(which is the vast, vast majority) 

you’ve expressed your opinions on this matter before. let me reassure you: it 
has been heard. bringing it up again is not going to cause meaningful change, 
but it sure does wonders for team morale when you basically say “nah, this 
still sucks too much ..”. i also don’t expect a single application developer 
to stick around when you talk about it that way.

keep your high standards for the technology. they are probably no higher than 
mine, btw. but please for the sake of the team and the future of plasma 
active, accept this is a point of disagreement that does not need to be 
reiterated over and over again.

> To me it's similar with bugs: I may have annoyed you and Marco and
> possible others as well when I insisted on several bugs being fixed
> before release.

this is not the same thing in the least, and i know that if you think about it 
for a moment or two that you’ll know that too.

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo
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