1) I had to Google around to find this post. Believe it or not, I didn't put it here. It was, originally, a submission to atomgrid.com. It's no longer in their burgeoning archives, and I have no idea who re-posted it under my name. To that person, I say 'thank you' and 'when theiving identities, it would be wise to do a Criminal Background Record check first'.

2) Not long after I wrote this, I left the life of the digital itinerant and started temping at brake parts factories in central Indiana. Best move I ever made.

3) In response to "Pat" <insert post-SNL curse reference here>: No, I do not consider women to be a possession, equivalent to food and shelter. I consider them to be a convertible commodity, though not nearly as convenient as Yap Island stone coins.

'give you their choisest women...'

So, Mike, in the universe between your ears women are a possession--same as good food and safe sleeping places.

Sometimes the (very long) message is lost because of the way it's delivered.

I like Agre's piece. He's an academic who actually applies his research. I provide tech support, and it's not that these people are stupid (ok, some are), they just don't have the language.

Nicely put, Mike.

The ultimate reason I went to grad school; I wanted to get the hell away from explaining (and un-fuck upping) stuff others had created (as a technical writer, teacher, tech supporter and sales trainer), and advance my skills to make my own stuff. And be able to talk to people who made stuff, rather than being a unseen intermediary way down the chain.

And, come to think of it, moving to Silicon Valley had the benefit of getting me the hell away from the many people to whom I was the Patient Helpful Guy Who'll Unfuck my Computer. God, it is amazingly great to never again have to work on fomer-coworker's-dad's computer, or show other former coworker how to delete icons from her screen, or deal with salespeople.

Stefan

God of Fire

by Mike Burtner

Imagine that you fall asleep in your recliner after a long night of Tekken Tag Tournament on the PlayStation 2 and you wake up in the camp of a Bronze Age tribe. You are wearing sweats, with only your trusty Zippo in hand. When you flick the lighter, your new followers bow before you and your Great Fire Box. You light a camp fire and they hold a dance in your honor.

They lay before you the best of their gathered food, their choicest women. As you lay down that night, satiated and warm in the choicest, safest sleeping area, you think, “Well, I may be in the Bronze Age, but at least I am the God of Fire.”

The next day, the head of the tribe asks you to work the great Fire Box. “What happened to the fire I made last night?” you ask. All you get is a puzzled glare. You light another fire and show the wary cave dwellers how to stoke it and keep it burning. Then you retreat to your pile of food, once again feeling affirmed as the savior of your people.

This goes on every day. The fire tenders are afraid of the spirit inside the fire. They do not understood why feeding wood to the fire spirits makes them grow, but feeding them water causes them to hiss and run away. No matter how you try, even at the risk of de-mystifying your “powers” and threatening your own deity, you cannot pass along the knowledge. You must light every fire, every day. You find yourself longing for your old life, hiding in your cubicle, making personal phone calls, and raiding the office kitchen for hot cocoa mix.

Don’t let this nightmare become your reality. Oh, sure, users will never catch on. But you don’t have to let it get to you. Just keep a few things in mind, and you will be able to enjoy your paycheck without spending most of it on anti-anxiety medication.

Users don’t want explanations.
Users don’t want to know what happened. When they say “Why did I lose all my e-mail?”, what they are really saying is “Why can’t you figure out what I did? Why can’t you just fix it, whatever it is?”

Users don’t want power; they want simplicity.
Don’t waste a lot of time explaining features. Don’t bother showing off time-saving wizards or macros; they’ll only end up wasting your own time as you explain them for the 3rd time, or fix whatever mission-critical data the user has corrupted while attempting to employ them.

“Help” is no help to the user.
Save valuable storage space; delete all help files associated with your applications. Keep them on your own PC, of course. Only you have the advanced knowledge necessary to navigate the mysterious backwaters of the help database.

Optionally, assign the F1 key on all PCs in the company to run Solitaire.

Don’t use technical jargon.
Flinging about concepts such as “deleting a file”, words like “application” or “user ID” will only exasperate the already put-upon user. You should be able to find lost files without putting the user through an inquisition over file names or save locations. You should know these things.

Users have intuition.
In your ivory tower of technical specifications and protocols, you can lose touch with what’s really happening. Remember: the simplest answer is usually the right one. When a user doesn’t receive a crucial piece of e-mail, the e-mail server probably is acting up again, regardless of what your management software says. If a particular web page is unavailable, the Internet is down. Don’t say “The whole Internet?!?” with that tone, either, smart-ass.