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I seem to be writing a lot of rants lately, but hey, that’s just how it goes.  Another question I have about users is why is it that whenever something goes wrong with a computer, it’s the computer’s fault.  People have the impression that computers are there to do things for them, when really, a computer is just a tool.  A computer helps a person with mundane tasks to accomplish a goal

The underlying problem here is that the big software companies (you know who) have tried to make the computer a friendly device which acts more like a co-worker than a typewriter.  People treat the computer like another person because it asks them questions and cute little paper-clips talk to them.  The function of asking questions and talking to them is simply a method of extracting information from people who can’t tell the computer what they want.  But from the user’s point of view, the computer is talking to them and therefore is doing things for them.  This is where things break down.

You see, so the user ends up thinking the computer is doing something for them when really they are using the computer to do something for themselves.  So when something goes wrong, it’s the computer’s fault, because the computer was doing it.

Now there are some cases where software or hardware is defective and in those cases, yes, the computer is to blame.  But when someone is using a program that is known to crash often, and they still continue to use it… can they really blame it when they lose their file?

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