At it's core, the post goes after what Joel calls architecture astronauts, high-end engineers who are so convinced of their greatness that they build what they want, without a care for what will actually move their company forward. Once he's defined terms and developed a full head of steam, he busts out the following:
What is it going to take for you to get the message that customers don't want the things that architecture astronauts just love to build. The people? They love twitter. And flickr and delicious and picasa and tripit and ebay and a million other fun things, which they do want, and this so called synchronization problem is just not an actual problem, it's a fun programming exercise that you're doing because it's just hard enough to be interesting but not so hard that you can't figure it out.
Anyone who's been face to reddened face with an architecture astronaut should, at this point, be out of their chair shouting "Amen Brother!" I certainly was.
1 comment:
Joel is fun reading because he rants, but I don't buy it in full.
I think so-called 'architecture astronauts' can be misguided, but the picture is a lot murkier.
People who get involved with computers at a deep level look for patterns. Sometimes the patterns do not appeal to users, but that is not always willful ignorance; sometimes it's just mistakes.
Also, not all specific apps are good, not all general apps evil. I think user-interface gurus would have us build the equivalent of more hot dog toasters which I find stupid and annoying, and would have never recommended building something as general as an operating system, which I find extremely useful.
DF
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