Lately it seems to me that more and more companies are contributing to the digital divide with their practices. I may run a state of the art machine, but my connectivity is limited by what I can afford and is available in my area. In other words dial-up of the 56K variety. I have spoken to many online who are hampered by this same stumbling block due to their location. We have started compiling a list of sites that are starting to really annoy us. Here are some recent examples:
Gamespot - owned by Cnet
First every single page is graphics heavy, it takes anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes for a basic forum page to load. Yes you read that correctly a page that should be nothing more than text. Why is this? I am not 100% sure but I THINK it has to do with those annoying adverts.
Zone Labs -
Yep, the makers of Zone Alarm. What is their problem? Ok, so when i try a file transfer with Opera it may or may not complete. BUT according to their site, one should download with I.E. Why? because it seems that other browsers including Firefox may corrupt the download. BAD show Zone Labs. If you want me to replace my MS preferred firewall with yours, then let me do so with my non MS browser. I will have more to say about Zone Labs in my next Blog - unfortunately. They used to be one of my favorite companies.
Yahoo.com -
Sigh, their new look and upgrade now take forever to load. Trillian had to be patched because of all the new "features" causing system crashes. I am starting to really hate all IMs.
Microsoft - well no surprise there. I have a slow connection and must use the classic mail on MSN. OK I have no problem with that, except that takes forever too. More of the issue is the upgrade etc process. It has nit yet become online only. But it was a pain trying to upgrade online with this old slow machine not running I.E. Add to that they expect everyone to have a credit card. Think about that. What would you do if you had no credit card? Ahh there is paypal right? Yep, except MS doesn't take them. What about an e-check? Nope, they don't take that either. Ok a money wire? Nope. Credit card or nothing. When Word coverts a doc to HTML it does not conform to W3 compliance. A lot of online text editors start getting weird if you try to paste from it or enter the HTML it generates. It is NOT that hard guys. Quit trying to be the owner of the internet and let everyone read stuff.
High schools - I hate to say this, but U.S. and Canadian High schools are adding to the issue. Many now require their students deliver their papers via a website and in .doc or is some cases .pdf format. What does that mean to a student with no machine at home? Hours at the library typing, writing and sending a paper. Same as any other student you say? Not really. One with a computer at home can do so at any time and with no time restrictions except those imposed by their parents. . One with access to the library only must write and send a paper within the hours the Library is open. Oh and most libraries limit time that one may have a computer. For those that do buy a machine they have to then put out the money for the applications that produce the required formats or do as my daughter did for a week or so, spend twice as much time on the paper for pure formatting reasons. I thought the purpose of paper writing was the content not the software format and the students' knowledge of commercial packages?
Neopets - Yes, the kid's site. One must now run the latest flash versions, have a fast connection and who knows what else in order to perform many actions. It is a shame that kids whose parents cannot afford the latest in technology cannot play all the games. What a great message to send to our kids. You need all the expensive stuff in order to compete.
This is a tip of the iceberg. Almost nothing here is crucial to existence, yet. The phone company seems to be moving more and more in the online direction. Which I should point out annoys me no end, how can I get online to check my status when my lines are down? Computer companies in general assume you have online access As I discovered in the almost 2 months I did not after the 98 machine's ports died. Lucky for me CDW, Circuit City and Best buy are all up the road and the library down the road. Companies need to rethink their strategies. If they want to take part in the global economy, they have to take into consideration that a person in a city in South Africa (yes that is where one of the brain-stormers of this was) may not have Vista, a high speed connection, a color printer or a credit card. They should consider not everyone in the world speaks English. (As my French and Danish gaming friends have pointed out.) Remember not everyone can see the pretty pictures that are slowing the load down as my blind friend says (he hates being called visually impaired btw) Not everyone can hear the music that takes forever to buffer as my father points out. I am tired of waiting for Pdfs to load for one small piece of information about my daughter's school arrival times. And last, but not least stop making all the tutorials as videos. Just make it so people who need information can get to it. It's not that difficult.
Showing posts with label Digital Divide. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Digital Divide. Show all posts
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Criticism is needed
For those of you who do not know in a previous life I was a professional writer/editor. Ok, perhaps it was this life, but it was long time ago. I have to say that while I was not working in a top publishing house, nor was I writing the Great American Novel, we were professionals. As such we always looked to improve our writing. The same was true when I began coding, we looked to others to assist us in writing more efficient code. Perhaps the entire program design was beautiful, but we always looked for ways to improve speed.
About ten years ago I noticed a slight change among new coders. When a suggestion was made for efficiency’s sake, they argued. I do not mean they said, hmm I’ll think about it and keep the code as it was – we all did that if we thought someone was wrong. Or maybe we would test it off on the side quietly . If the suggestion was a significant improvement the app changed, if not no more would be said. But each coder took pride in their work and strove to produce the best they could. I mean the new coders would argue the point as if the person making the suggestion had not actually reviewed the code. (Code reviews were mandatory by the way) “But I HAVE to use a nested IF instead of a CASE here.” And twenty minutes later they would walk off either having decided the coder with 15 years experience was out to get them, had antiquated views or did not know anything about the new world of code, leaving the senior coder scratching his or her head and returning to their project. But as a boss once told me a great coder is like a racehorse and some have a bit of an ego. We would shrug and continue.
I now see this attitude permeate every aspect of work. It seems no one can take criticism or even suggestions for improvement. It was a sad day when this became apparent in the writing community. Yes,I still keep my hand in. I always have. I am a member of several writers’ groups. I edit for a few sites. I have written online doco for a few. I am sad to say that it has finally become the case that writers no longer seek constructive criticism. Rather they seek to be stroked told how great their piece is and perhaps have a couple of grammatical errors pointed out. I have been in groups where if someone suggests that a paragraph is unclear to them the writer argues rather than asks for further input or for suggestions f how to make it clearer.
It has become the norm to ridicule the critique and its writer rather than thank the person for taking the time to go through the piece and offer suggestions. Nothing says you HAVE take them. One site on which I am an editor offers an award for top sites. We have certain criteria we must check and once that is done it becomes a matter of personal opinion. A petitioner for the award failed some of the base criteria, which includes things like: onsite links must terminate to a page with relevent content, HTML must pass W3 compliance, music must be by request, etc. I informed him his site was not ready for an in depth critique and moved on. The idea is not to critique the contents of the site until the mechanics are completed. Being the best of the best means all code works, the site looks good, is accessable to everyone and contributes uniquely in some way to the RPG community. The site designer/owner argued that the minimum requirements for consideration were unfair. He wanted the prize with out the work. When it was pointed out to him some was merely HTML choices for basic formatting (non W3 compliance) He replied he was not a coder, just a designer. I curbed my tongue and did not state, "Then when you are good enough to try for the award do so otherwise do not waste my time." Sorry but the point of the award is that it is the best of the best overall. If you are not capable of making the site so, do not whine. Go learn how to do it and try.
Which brings me back to the old days in writing. I functioned as both an editor and writer. None of us felt we were writing a great novel. We wrote user manuals for commercial and proprietary software packages and accompanying training materials. Her is how it would work. The author would write a guide. A first level (copy) editor would go through the guide looking for obvious errors in grammar and ensure it complied with the house style.and A tech editor would run through the guide step by step, check the veracity of the information and perhaps catch some errors the copy editor missed. The manuscript would be marked up and sent back to the writer to make changes. The writer would make them or not.
The editors would go over the new manuscript when it arrived, test and make further suggestions and send it back. The writer would do what he or she wanted and send it back. IF an editor noticed a common error they might mention it to the writer: watch tense, avoid to be, use active voice. That was all part of the editor’s job. If a paragraph or more really needed a rewrite it would be noted. The manuscript was sent back again to the editors after changes were made. It was in the best interest of the writer to make the suggested changes. Why? Because the editors had the manuscript last. Many were the times I rewrote a manual that was wrong technically, too long (there are page limits set), or was just poorly written. We called that a heavy edit. Yes, the author’s name went on the work. And we usually never re-contracted with that writer again. Why? Because there are a lot of writers out there who are willing and able to comply with a house style.
What saddens me is the lack of desire by writers to improve their craft. I give some of my worst writing to those groups of which I am a member to critique. Why? Because I know the good stuff is good. I can work with that. It is the parts I need help with that I present. The portions I KNOW are not working. I have received 0 critiques. Why? I request specifically for people to pull them apart. Grammar, I do not worry about too much that is what grammar checkers are for. But tense, tone, action, am I clear? Have I missed stating something does the dialog seem contrived? Does the action seem contrived? Is too much time spent on something? Not enough? Does the piece convey the feeling I want it to through the language used? If I am lucky I will be told “I got confused here who had what.” Most of the time I get, “it’s good, you have a typo here and that’s it now onto the next piece.”
I know I am not that good. Is it that I am such bad writer that they cannot say anything about it to improve it other than throw it out? Is it that they are afraid they will hurt my feelings? I suspect it is more that they are afraid I will argue and take up too much time or that they want to get to their pieces as soon as possible to hear exactly the same “It’s good, maybe change the tense here, now on to the next piece.” It is sad people have lost interest in improvement and rather hear praise than suggestions. But then that would be why so many computer applications are released with bugs. It takes less time money and energy to write a patch than to argue with a Prima Dona.
About ten years ago I noticed a slight change among new coders. When a suggestion was made for efficiency’s sake, they argued. I do not mean they said, hmm I’ll think about it and keep the code as it was – we all did that if we thought someone was wrong. Or maybe we would test it off on the side quietly . If the suggestion was a significant improvement the app changed, if not no more would be said. But each coder took pride in their work and strove to produce the best they could. I mean the new coders would argue the point as if the person making the suggestion had not actually reviewed the code. (Code reviews were mandatory by the way) “But I HAVE to use a nested IF instead of a CASE here.” And twenty minutes later they would walk off either having decided the coder with 15 years experience was out to get them, had antiquated views or did not know anything about the new world of code, leaving the senior coder scratching his or her head and returning to their project. But as a boss once told me a great coder is like a racehorse and some have a bit of an ego. We would shrug and continue.
I now see this attitude permeate every aspect of work. It seems no one can take criticism or even suggestions for improvement. It was a sad day when this became apparent in the writing community. Yes,I still keep my hand in. I always have. I am a member of several writers’ groups. I edit for a few sites. I have written online doco for a few. I am sad to say that it has finally become the case that writers no longer seek constructive criticism. Rather they seek to be stroked told how great their piece is and perhaps have a couple of grammatical errors pointed out. I have been in groups where if someone suggests that a paragraph is unclear to them the writer argues rather than asks for further input or for suggestions f how to make it clearer.
It has become the norm to ridicule the critique and its writer rather than thank the person for taking the time to go through the piece and offer suggestions. Nothing says you HAVE take them. One site on which I am an editor offers an award for top sites. We have certain criteria we must check and once that is done it becomes a matter of personal opinion. A petitioner for the award failed some of the base criteria, which includes things like: onsite links must terminate to a page with relevent content, HTML must pass W3 compliance, music must be by request, etc. I informed him his site was not ready for an in depth critique and moved on. The idea is not to critique the contents of the site until the mechanics are completed. Being the best of the best means all code works, the site looks good, is accessable to everyone and contributes uniquely in some way to the RPG community. The site designer/owner argued that the minimum requirements for consideration were unfair. He wanted the prize with out the work. When it was pointed out to him some was merely HTML choices for basic formatting (non W3 compliance) He replied he was not a coder, just a designer. I curbed my tongue and did not state, "Then when you are good enough to try for the award do so otherwise do not waste my time." Sorry but the point of the award is that it is the best of the best overall. If you are not capable of making the site so, do not whine. Go learn how to do it and try.
Which brings me back to the old days in writing. I functioned as both an editor and writer. None of us felt we were writing a great novel. We wrote user manuals for commercial and proprietary software packages and accompanying training materials. Her is how it would work. The author would write a guide. A first level (copy) editor would go through the guide looking for obvious errors in grammar and ensure it complied with the house style.and A tech editor would run through the guide step by step, check the veracity of the information and perhaps catch some errors the copy editor missed. The manuscript would be marked up and sent back to the writer to make changes. The writer would make them or not.
The editors would go over the new manuscript when it arrived, test and make further suggestions and send it back. The writer would do what he or she wanted and send it back. IF an editor noticed a common error they might mention it to the writer: watch tense, avoid to be, use active voice. That was all part of the editor’s job. If a paragraph or more really needed a rewrite it would be noted. The manuscript was sent back again to the editors after changes were made. It was in the best interest of the writer to make the suggested changes. Why? Because the editors had the manuscript last. Many were the times I rewrote a manual that was wrong technically, too long (there are page limits set), or was just poorly written. We called that a heavy edit. Yes, the author’s name went on the work. And we usually never re-contracted with that writer again. Why? Because there are a lot of writers out there who are willing and able to comply with a house style.
What saddens me is the lack of desire by writers to improve their craft. I give some of my worst writing to those groups of which I am a member to critique. Why? Because I know the good stuff is good. I can work with that. It is the parts I need help with that I present. The portions I KNOW are not working. I have received 0 critiques. Why? I request specifically for people to pull them apart. Grammar, I do not worry about too much that is what grammar checkers are for. But tense, tone, action, am I clear? Have I missed stating something does the dialog seem contrived? Does the action seem contrived? Is too much time spent on something? Not enough? Does the piece convey the feeling I want it to through the language used? If I am lucky I will be told “I got confused here who had what.” Most of the time I get, “it’s good, you have a typo here and that’s it now onto the next piece.”
I know I am not that good. Is it that I am such bad writer that they cannot say anything about it to improve it other than throw it out? Is it that they are afraid they will hurt my feelings? I suspect it is more that they are afraid I will argue and take up too much time or that they want to get to their pieces as soon as possible to hear exactly the same “It’s good, maybe change the tense here, now on to the next piece.” It is sad people have lost interest in improvement and rather hear praise than suggestions. But then that would be why so many computer applications are released with bugs. It takes less time money and energy to write a patch than to argue with a Prima Dona.
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