In all earnestness, I start seeing the "SqueezeBox" product range go
down the wrong path. Having been a product manager myself for a long
time, I hear the alarm bells shrill for quite some time now.
As a developer, being enthusiastic for some time, I'm constantly losing
interest in cooperation, because the development paths seem unclear and
not well-defined, old bugs keep resurfacing, odd decisions are made (and
taken back).
The product itself (Duet and the Controller, mainly) keeps getting more
unusable with every "update" -- one starts getting anxious ("What will
break this time?") instead of happily anticipating things getting better
and more usable -- and being able to USE it for what it's meant: An
enyojable way of listening and showing off your music.
Successful products are "emotional" products, remember? So why isn't
the emotion a good one, but frustration mostly?
Slimserver and the Squeezebox products have long kept you feeling that
you are at the top of current technology, running with the fast crowd,
simply owning and using the best you can possibly get. And be proud of
it. Albeit having a few minor problems, you simply KNEW these would be
gone soon -- and usually you'd get something better beyond all
expectations.
Here's how the current development looks to an "outsider" (i.e.,
someone who knows about product management, development, usability,
marketing, but also insists in keeping the standpoint of a
"user"/"buyer") today:
- There is no clear path where to go. What are the goals, where is
the target market?
- We keep adding "glitz" and pomp. Because we don't know how to focus
on the basic problems and hope the user won't mind lack of basic
functionality because there's so much "nice" stuff.
- Bugs long gone and repaired keep surfacing again. And again. Ideas
comes to mind, like "Do they ever USE their stuff themselves?" ...
"Why the heck do we have to fight the character set wars again and
again since 30 years? Don't they ever learn that there ARE characters
beyond 0-9 and A-Z?"
- It's all too technical. I want MUSIC. And the BEST and most USABLE
way to handle it. Today, it's all about bug fixing, Perl programming,
product name changes, database issues no one understands (and which
they take back after investing so much efforts into a solution that's
worse than before -- and while they take back the changes to "what we
got before", they break even what we HAD before!).
- Even (external) developers get frustrated -- after investing so
many countless hours into repairing things that get broken again next
day. (Yes, the code IS*great; yes, they have thought about almost
everything already; but they keep overlooking SIMPLE things over and
over again -- probably because no one has shown them that some things
ARE important to USERS. Even with Open Source, goals need to be
defined, and milestones met. And everyone in the team needs to know
"where we all want to go".)
- Look at the "new" controller firmware. It LOOKS worse. It's
unusable beyond expectation. It needs more keystrokes for simple
functions. It doesn't behave logical or even consistent. BUT it has
overlaid screens that nobody needs, it overlaps badly rendered cover
images with status lines, it uses LARGE fonts so that you have to wait
for some information to scroll until -- in the middle of reading --
the screensaver pops in and you have to press yet another key ...
Aaaargh! It has a zillion "effects" that DISTRACT (instead of
FOCUSING) the user's attention, while lacking some basic
functionality. Oh well, and it has "apps"! Does anyone need "apps"
while the basics don't function yet? ... I doubt it.
- It's great to let the "tech kiddies" show off. And they can
actually be a very valuable resource -- if LEAD correctly. PLEASE,
Logitech, hire someone who knows about USABILITY. And probably how to
manage a product line.
- It still IS (could be?) such a great product line. Don't throw it
away like this.
This reads like a rant. It is. Because I still love the product and the
ideas behind it. (Emotion, remember?) I hope that the right people can
understand my current frustration. And ACT.
I really wouldn't like to see others "winning" in spite of having
higher prices and worse technology. But knowing what the customer wants.
Keep the promise! Even if it's only in our heads.
Thank you for reading.
--
Moonbase
Moonbase: 'The Problem Solver' (http://www.kaufen-ist-toll.de/moonbase)
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View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=66745
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