In the care and feeding of software engineers, Nicholas Zakas says:

I have a theory. That theory is that software engineers see themselves very differently than those with whom they work. I’ve come to this conclusion after over a decade in the software industry working at companies large and small. Companies (product managers, designers, other managers) tend to look at software engineers as builders. It’s the job of the product manager to dream up what to build, the job of the designer to make it aesthetically pleasing, and the job of the engineer to build what they came up with. Basically, engineers are looked at as the short-order cooks of the industry.

UX is often spoken of in terms of the look and feel of visual elements: the layout of a navigation or the arrangement of fields on a form. A UI-layer thing.

It’s comforting to believe this: you’ve a specialist on your team who can deal with the “UX stuff”. This is a delusion. One person isn’t capable of covering all your bases because UX is defined by virtually every facet of your product, from design through implementation. While the UXer on your team can oversee things to an extent, it’s hard for them to retrofit good UX if it’s not baked in from the start.

Skype are trialling running adverts within your Skype calls. How anyone could imagine this is a good idea is quite beyond me.

We’re excited to introduce Conversations Ads as an opportunity for marketers to reach our hundreds of millions of connected users in a place where they can have meaningful conversations about brands in a highly engaging environment. Skype is already at the center of meaningful conversations, where families, friends, and colleagues spend time together.

With Facebook’s disappointing appearance on the U.S. stock market, it’s as good a time as any to look at how they plan to make money. This is interesting if you are an investor for obvious reasons, but it should also concern you as a user: it reflects how safe Facebook is as a social investment for the long term and how desperate they need to be to make money from you.

Three Things That Should Trouble Apple

The three problems relate to content. However, this particular paragraph sums up all my frustration with the current music/video/book situation:

Right now I’m still juggling a bunch of bullshit that I really shouldn’t need to. Basically, I’ll pay you money if you provide me content I’d like to enjoy. There’s so many weird and random restrictions on that simple deal that I still don’t know how it’ll ultimately play out.