Shorts
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Think Before You Make
At Wordcamp ‘09 (January before last), in my talk I said “Plug-ins suck!”. I believe in it as much now as I did back then. But I want to take that thought and apply it to something bigger.
A platform is as useful as the uses it is put to. I guess it’s wrong to call out the platform because of its uses, but that’s how I see it. When you turn the browser’s chrome into a platform, people start doing some strange things with it just because it can be done. If you want the worst case scenario, look at Flock.
I’m just a little tired of seeing people make something but not care about how useful or meaningful it is. The web has undergone a Wave-ification, and I don’t like it. It has made developers believe “build and they will come” a little too seriously. Why think about a revenue model? Why think about its usability or the user-experience? Why think that the time you’re spending should return something other than good wishes and maybe turn you into a mini-celebrity. I wish we would start thinking about what we’re making long enough to make sense of it.
And if thinking about something long enough makes you not want to make it, there’s probably a reason.
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