metacard digest, Vol 1 #604 - 14 msgs

[Richard MacLemale]

Richard Gaskin wrote:

> I'd be interested in how they expressed their preference, what reasons they
> gave for using one over another.  Offline is good if it's too OT to post
> here.  Whether rational or not, their perceptions are critical to
> understanding how to manage expectations as adroitly as we manage Internet
> protocols.

Caution - Lengthy Post

Some of this is based on conversations with teachers and some is based on
speculation based on teacher's comments and attitudes.  But here's why (I
believe) teachers were not interested in the app:

I required them to download the app from our staff documents server on our
local network.  This meant they actually had to go and get the thing.  Most
of them chose not to.  Some actually downloaded the program, but never used
it.  So why didn't they download it?  It's possible that some didn't know
how.  I've shown them, but some people choose to be "tech-stupid."  Some
other people maybe decided they didn't want to put up a web page for
whatever reason.  I didn't do a good enough job of selling them on the
benefits of a web page.  Then there's the "impulse" factor.  There was no
"impulse" to making a web page - they had to download the thing first.
Also, I think that some teachers had the attitude of "I don't want to learn
a new program."

This is going to sound like I have no respect for my end users, but here it
is nonetheless - anything that I do, for it to be successful, has to be
designed for idiots.  Idiot-proof.  So easy to use that a 4th grader could
do it.  Dave Barry (the author and columnist) says that people are smart
about some things and total idiots about other things, and he called it
something like "selective stupidity."  A person who can study accounting and
statistics in college can't program his own damn VCR.  Why?  Selective
stupidity.

So to get someone to use something you've programmed, you can either:
1.  Make something that fills a need that people are desperately looking to
fill
2.  Make it so easy that people will give it a shot, and some people will
continue using it
3.  A combination of both.

And no matter what, you have to SELL the concept.  The number one reason
that Apple is not dead right now is Steve Jobs.  Jobs could sell sand in a
desert.  The Apple analogy goes deeper in a few paragraphs.

Now that I think about it, I think that the web page version did better
because it was easier to get to, AND because I did a much better sales job
when I presented it.  Had I put the app on their hard drives and done a
better sales job, some folks might have used it (but not 40%.)  Had I showed
them the web page, but not done a sales job, it would not have gone over as
well.

What do I conclude from all of this?  A good software solution must satisfy
the following elements:
1.  Be extremely easy to use
2.  Solve a problem that people want solved
3.  Make something normally difficult extremely easy
4.  Be "sold" (evangelized) well

When you read those four points, it looks an awful lot like Apple's recent
software philosophy for their "i-apps," doesn't it?  iMovie is the poster
child for a great app.  It's easy to use, it does something that people
want, and it makes something hard (video editing) extremely easy.

Which brings us back to app vs. web page.  I don't have any statistics on
sales of software titles, but I'd be willing to bet that over the past 5
years, software sales (except for video games) are not growing as fast as
they should be.  Anecdotal evidence:  CompUSA, five years ago, seemed like a
huge part of the store was Windows software.  Now, they've taken many of
those shelves and gone into PS 2 games, palm stuff, DVD stuff, and other
non-software items.  The software shelf space has been reduced.  When I talk
to my friends and family, I don't often hear about people going out and
"buying a new program."  Finding a new website, however, is a constant
source of discussion.  I think people's attitudes about apps have changed.
I'm not sure why.  I would speculate that the almost unlimited content of
the Internet has made the common "make a calendar" application seem trivial.
In the elementary education software market, sales of edutainment games
industry-wide are definitely down.  Each year the Florida Educational
Technology Conference features more and more Internet-based stuff.

This paragraph is really generalized, but bear with me.  Power users will
still grab up single-purpose apps.  But the appeal of "just go online" is
strong.  People do not think of going to a web page as anything special.
It's the ONE thing that everyone can do.  People have always secretly
thought that the computer should have one program that could do everything.
But they wouldn't think of the program as being a program... They want to
think of the computer as just being "the computer" which can "do
everything."  This would not involve learning different programs... People
would like to not ever have to "learn a new app."  And that's why, once
people learn to use the browser, they are willing to do so much with it.
The browser is almost like what they wish the computer would be - one app
that does everything.

The programs that break this mold - iMovie, iTunes, etc - point out how
stupid and limited the "one app can do everything" mentality is.  Power
users will never ever have one app to do everything.

When I sum this whole lengthy post up, it leads to my current software
philosophy - if I can do it in a web page using mc cgi, that will be my
first choice.  If not, I'll write a MetaCard app.  I end up writing web
pages with cgi scripts for our teachers, and MetaCard apps for the other
tech specialists in my county.

And I am very interested in hearing other opinions on this topic!  The
better we understand end users, the better we can code.

-- 
:)
Richard MacLemale
Network Administrator
J. W. Mitchell High School