Whoops, we haven't been able to send email to your new address! We've tried sending confirmation emails to shag at gmail.orn but they are not getting delivered.
You can <https://twitter.com/settings/account?change_email=true>change to a different address or we can <http://twitter.com/#>try again.
Either they really do care about the user experience and you somehow missed the message. Or, after I wrote them to point out the problem, they redballed this fix.
If it's the latter, and they implemented this fix after I wrote, I find it an interesting illustration of something you're not quite grasping when you claim open source openness is a preferred approach.
here's why. The reason why open source is ostensibly less buggy (a point with which I disagree) is that it supposedly follow the open source dictum that _everyone_ participates in the production of software. That includes YOU, a user.
why? Because the philosophy behind this (which has been a fondation of agile software dev methodology, which is embraced by proprietary and open shops alike) is the following: software is a fucking process. there's no way on earth each of the roles involved in software development should work in isolation. The business stakeholders, the users, the testers, the developers, the product managers, the business analysts should not work in isolation from one another. One reason why: because no one ever occupying any role can be perfect. A product developer gathering specs for an app cann't cover every damn requirement under the sun. A developer can't know every damn thing about a business's needs. A business stakeholder may totally suck at communicating what she wants. Users may have no idea what they want or what really works for them, let alone what's best for the majority.
As a consequence, an open source model of development emphasizes collaboration, right?
Except, if all you do is hate twitter and bitch at LBO and never find a way to tell twitter what the problem is, you'll never help them fix the bug and make users happier.
As others have said about the supposed superiority of open source software: there's an assumption that, with enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow. There's an assumption, in other words, that creating software is a collaboration, that no man is an island, that no software developer is ever sprung from the head of zeus, all knowing, omnisciently capable of understanding what is best for the majority of users.
What you seem to want is a development process (and developers) who are perfect, all-knowing. Ain't never gonna happen under any system of production. hence, open source assumes its users to be part of the process of reporting and even fixing bugs. Why? Because the model _assumes_ software will be buggy - even when you are not operating under the profit motive.
>[WS:] This is a really interesting insight which kind of dove-tails with my
>perceptions of how business works (not necessarily IT). In a way, it is a
>product of capitalism.
>
>Competition forces companies to adopt technological solutions that protect
>or gain market shares. And the fact that their solutions are pieces of crap
>does not mater, because consumers can only choose by different types of
>similar privately produced crap and "public option" is not available. There
>are several consequences of that:
>
>1. Even if a private providers develops or stumbles upon a good solution,
>that solution may be dumped in favor of marketing gimmicks (of the ipod
>-schmypod type for example.)
>
>2. Proprietary solutions are not conducive to the accumulation of experience
>and building on shared foundations. This lowers the quality of the product
>(i.e. making it more error-prone) while increasing the transaction cost,
>which is being dumped on the consumer. For example, if I want to use, say
>Microsoft outlook to synchronize my email, I need to buy the whole line of
>Microsoft products, the OS, the Office Suite etc.
>
>3. Planned obsolescence is the norm, because it is dictated by the market
>demand for certain level of profitability and it forces companies to adopt
>dubious innovations to stay profitable and maintain their market position,
>instead of building up on the strengths of their past solutions. Again, this
>increases the probability of error and tremendously increases waste, but as
>long as the consumer or the government can be saddled with the cost of that
>waste - this whole topsy-turvy model appears as a paragon of "business
>efficiency."
>
>In sum, the problem lies not that much with deficient programming skills,
>but with the fact that these skills often take the back seat to marketing
>and marketing gimmicks. Who cares if we produce crap as long as that crap
>sells and the management (and key stockholders) are happy.
>
>Eubulides: "Imagine Woj's [great?] grandparents:"
>
>[WS:} You missed my point altogether. I am not complaining about
>technological innovation but the shoddy quality of that innovation that
>leaves people with even mild disabilities in the dust. In fact I have always
>been quick in adopting new technologies, but I resent the idiotic drive to
>change things around merely for marketing purposes. It has little to do
>with new technology and everything to do with capitalism, and it sucks.
>
>Wojtek
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On Thu, Jan 20, 2011 at 10:25 PM, <123hop at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> > It's all totally fucked up. I had to switch to a new cell phone today & I
> > could not for the life of me figure out how to download a ringtone. (It's
> > Bach or nothing.) I spent an hour trying to do it on the phone; I spent an
> > hour trying to do it off the web; I called support and they spent a half an
> > hour trying to do it.
> >
> > Something's wrong with their server I think.
> >
> > Ugh,
> >
> > Joanna
> > ___________________________________
> > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
> >
>___________________________________
>http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
-- http://cleandraws.com Wear Clean Draws ('coz there's 5 million ways to kill a CEO)