So when you have a bad take machine, you get the following processes:
They make a bad take.
People are outraged and talk about it.
The bad take machine likes it and does more of that behaviour in future.
If, on the other hand, they make a take and nobody cares, they do not get reward and the behaviour is selected against.
The behaviours drove the spread of the outrage replicator, and the outrage replicator provides the selection mechanism for the behaviours. Thus, via the spread of our outrage on Twitter, we have operant conditioned the bad take machine into producing worse takes.
Which is to say, it's bad on purpose to make you replicate it.
You just handed off a major redesign. Three months of research, twenty-seven major revisions, and hundreds cups of coffee have all culminated in this pinnacle of glory. It’s finally done!
Except it’s not.
It’s not, even after you have answered every single question the developers have about your red-line.
It’s not, even after you have addressed all the technical constraints developers encountered during the implementation.
It’s not, even after you meticulously documented all the patterns and styles into a library for reference and reuse.
It’s not, because neither you nor the developers have talked to a real user. At the bottom of your heart, you are secretly wishing:
My design looks great on paper, so let’s keep it on paper.
Post-occupancy evaluation (POE) is a practice in the building industry where an architect would visit the building after its occupancy and interview its residents. It sounds like a great opportunity for collecting feedback and learning from mistakes, but it’s rarely practiced. Why?
Many awe-inspiring, prize-winning architectures are half building, half sculpture. Often made of specially molded concrete and steel, they are extremely expensive to alter, let alone any alteration would also attack the architect’s prestige and pride. So whatever usability issues the POE identifies will remain as issues, unless the architect wants to accept the public criticism and shame that comes with the remodeling.
In fear of criticism, an architect would turn down the opportunity for POE, and continue to design the same roof that would leak water in future projects.
In fear of criticism, a developer would use customer service representatives as a shield against user complaints, while focusing on the “technical” aspect of things.
In fear of criticism, a designer would close the contract as soon as the client accepts the design, even though none of the real users are represented by the client.