The almighty .plan

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +1100

Early, but this is my insightful post of the year (by 'Causality'):

   ... people are often rather eager to excuse and defend
   incompetent users out of some misguided sympathy for them. Real
   compassion for them would mean teaching, explaining, and
   providing good references for their edification. It would not
   mean excusing their failures or sugarcoating their incompetence.

   Any literate adult can achieve competency with a computer, and
   most problems that make the network a worse place for everyone
   directly involve users who lack knowledge, so why the "get off
   your high horse" spite towards those who expect better?

   If anything, I think the "high horse" is the belief that
   users will always be ignorant, will always be victims of these
   security issues, and can never overcome them. It is not the
   belief that they can and should overcome them.

      http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1575094&cid=31402934

Hognoxious's followup provides an important clarification:

   Not knowing isn't stupid. It's ignorant, and that can be cured. Refusing
   to know, even when you've been (repeatedly) told - now that's stupid.

Another from Baxxter:

   A driver should be aware of their fuel economy, but it's more
   likely the job of a specialist to determine why the fuel economy
   has changed. Knowing if the difference is due to the air
   filter/oil filter/radiator/spark plug/exhaust/fuel filter, or
   any of the other parts which could cause this problem is
   generally left to someone knowledgeable. The end-user should
   only be expected to notice the issue and request help...