This is somewhat true, but we can't redefine every phrase from first principles whenever we use it. Web search has been a thing for decades now. People will simply have to learn things; we can't cater to an indefinite amount of ignorance.
When you have a billion users I would argue that you do need to cater to an indefinite amount of ignorance, where "ignorance" here means wildly varying levels of technical experience.
I agree with catering to your target audience in theory; however, at that scale, you're going to have people screw up anyway, no matter how many explanations, warnings, or prompts you add.
I've shipped software which could be installed by clicking "Yes" twice, and somehow a non-negligible amount of people are still puzzled by the setup process. It's tiring.
> and somehow a non-negligible amount of people are still puzzled by the setup process. It's tiring.
Probably the process wasn't researched enough. You can do focus groups with customers or even hire members of the public for a discovery session and see how accessible process is and then refine. Technical teams are often severely biased and what they think should be easy and natural might be quite the opposite to other people who are not deeply involved with the domain.
The installer consists of a "Yes (to accepting the license agreement)", waiting on a progress bar, and a "Yes (to starting the program)." It is like almost every installation wizard ever seen on a computer, except simpler and no bundled adware.
When I've asked the ~5-10% of people who are confused, they've done at least one of the following:
* Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer.
* Gave up immediately and exited.
* Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process.
This kind of stuff has me at a loss for words, and overall, it makes me more jaded when producing software for the "average" end-user. There's only so much magic I can put in, and I already do a lot of work to make sure most stuff I make is as user-friendly as possible. Plenty of people don't actually read explanations, even a few words; you can't really help them at that point.
Some people are just incompetent. Easiest thing is to write them off as customers: they will be an outsize source of pain. If they can’t manage an installer that simple, how will they ever use the software?
> Admit they clicked at random, and somehow closed the installer.
> Gave up immediately and exited.
Seems like someone with ADHD.
> Complained there was no video tutorial for a sixty-second process.
Could be someone with Dyspraxia.
These behaviours might be puzzling to neurotypical people, but they exist and are reality for many users. It's also not connected to that person intelligence in any way. Their brains just operate differently.
Perhaps it does, but it begs the question of "how did they operate the computer at all?" These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus.
> Could be someone with Dyspraxia.
Fair.
In any case, as only one person developing a program for free in my spare time, I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario.
> These same people seem to have no trouble accomplishing other tasks they want to do on the computer--tasks which require more focus.
That's common. ADHD has this kind of paradoxes. People can hyperfocus on tasks that align with interests or feel stimulating and become completely overwhelmed by other tasks, even seemingly simple.
> I don't have the time or ability to cater for every scenario.
That's fair, but still it's at least worth being mindful about accessibility issues some people face. For big corporations this is inexcusable.
For some reason desktop installers are weirdly complicated. Why are there two yes buttons instead of one or none? Maybe you have to accept the OS's warning dialog but perhaps installers should just work without any interaction. You can always uninstall if you ran it by mistake.
FWIW, if it is "public", I'd think it would merely be something anyone could access if they already knew where it was, a concept that people experience often with "public" share URLs from numerous services; being "discoverable" is much stronger, as it tells us that random people are going to be able to search and, well, discover it.
I mean, this isn't consistent with the usual definition of public, especially on sites that let you share content:
* YouTube uses "public" for viewable by everyone and discoverable; for something that should only be accessible if the URL is shared, then YouTube uses the term "unlisted"
* Facebook uses "public" similarly
More generally, "to publish" (related to the adjective "public") means to make something generally known, as opposed to simply sharing with a closed group (even if they can share it too).
I'd like to add that the web search button in the ChatGPT interface is labled "Web search". And even when it starts searching on its own, it displays "searching the web...".
Why is no one asking what purpose is served by indexing ChatGPT conversations? Why is this necessary? There is no option on your bank's website to 'make your finances discoverable' or your health insurance website to 'make your medical records discoverable'. It is not a matter of making it easier for people to understand what it is doing, it is a matter of thinking 'what could go wrong' and then determining if it is worth the risk to expose the option to do it.
ChatGPT is a website. "Web search" can literally mean that person will be able to find their chat through the search on the website and might assume it will not be available for everyone to see (because in their mind that would be too insane to be true).
You can also take into account people who are literate but are neurodivergent. This options was too ambiguous and should have contained more context explaining what "Web search" actually means. You would still get people misunderstanding it.
To me this looks like someone from marketing thought it would be cool to have conversations discoverable through search to "boost" awareness of the service, but in my opinion that is incredibly dumb and it is bizarre that nobody said "hang on a minute, isn't this stupid?" and it's gotten all the way to production.
"Share" where? This doesn't have the same meaning for everyone. If you come to use the feature with intent to share it with your friend, you don't assume you will be sharing it with the whole internet.
At that point you haven't decided; that's the whole point of the selections that come after you've chosen to share it.
>Make this chat discoverable (Allows it to be shown in web searches)
If you don't want that behavior, not checking it is advisable.
I'm no apologist for bad UI/UX; the tech industry is rife with it. I frequently mutter something like "how is the average person supposed to puzzle this out?" when I'm navigating insane flows on mainstream web apps.
But, I'm with the other commenters who say we can't dumb everything down into nothingness, if we want anything resembling progress. This doesn't just extend to technology.
You're assuming that clarity is universal - that if you understand something, it must be clear enough for everyone else. That's a textbook case of the false consensus effect and _neurotypical bias_.
"Make this chat discoverable (Allows it to be shown in web searches)" is not unambiguous. Many people - especially those with ASD, ADHD, or even just different mental models - interpret "web search" as internal search on the platform. That's a completely reasonable interpretation given how most websites work. Even the word "discoverable" sounds passive and controlled, not synonymous with "permanently indexed by Google."
UX isn't about spoon-feeding idiots. It's about reducing cognitive load and accommodating different cognitive styles. Good UI accounts for diverse interpretations and explains high-stakes actions with precision. This option failed that standard.
And your argument boils down to: "Well, it told you, technically." That’s not good enough. Legally, ethically, and practically, when an action has severe privacy implications, "technically correct" is a euphemism for design failure.
This isn't about dumbing things down. It's about not designing exclusively for people who think like you. If you exclude everyone who reads or processes information differently, you're not building tech for the public - you're just building for a clique.
