If we want users to like our software we should design it to behave like a likeable person: respectful, generous and helpful.
Interpretation
Software should be designed to be user-friendly and behave in a manner that is pleasant and supportive.
This quote emphasizes the importance of user-centered design in software development. It suggests that by making software behave in ways that embody traits of a likable person—such as being respectful, generous, and helpful—developers can create a more engaging and enjoyable experience for users, leading to greater overall satisfaction and success.
In practice
During a tech conference presentation about user experience, one might quote this to emphasize the need for empathy in design.
Run for your lives-the computers are invading. Awesomely powerful computers tackling ever more important tasks with awkward, old-fashioned interfaces. As these machines leak into every corner of our lives, they will annoy us, infuriate us, and even kill a few of us. In turn, we will be tempted to kill our computers, but we won't dare because we are already utterly, irreversibly dependent on these hopeful monsters that make modern life possible.
Design principle: Take things away until the design breaks, then put that last thing back in.
To our human minds, computers behave less like rocks and trees than they do like humans, so we unconsciously treat them like people.... In other words, humans have special instincts that tell them how to behave around other sentient beings, and as soon as any object exhibits sufficient cognitive function, those instincts kick in and we react as though we were interacting with another sentient human being.
No matter how beautiful, no matter how cool your interface, it would be better if there were less of it.
Innovation has nothing to do with how many R & D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R & D. It's not about money. It's about the people you have, how you're led, and how much you get it.
The only way to make software secure, reliable, and fast is to make it small.
Let us hope that the advent of a successful flying machine, now only dimly foreseen and nevertheless thought to be possible, will bring nothing but good into the world; that it shall abridge distance, make all parts of the globe accessible, bring men into closer relation with each other, advance civilization, and hasten the promised era in which there shall be nothing but peace and goodwill among all men.
Bitcoin is mostly about anonymous transactions, and I don't think over time that's a good way to go. I'm a huge believe in digital currency... but doing it on an anonymous basis I think that leads to some abuses, so I'm not involved in Bitcoin.
Technological society has succeeded in multiplying the opportunities for pleasure, but it has great difficulty in generating joy.
Machines take me by surprise with great frequency.
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