It's probably pessimism to think that the gap between developers and users
will continue to widen. It's already pretty wide.
Hopefully the "open sores" marketing department will just vacuum up all the
potential open sores customers and they will be able to purchase a superior
product to winblows, the customer service packages of their choices, and
leave us the eff alone.
Those of us who have some knowledge will probably need to be reminded subtly
and gently, the way you just did with those asterisks, that we are biological
organisms. White men in suits and ties have spent millions of dollars
learning how to kick our bruises in very specific ways. They want us to break
windows and burn down walmarts so they can pass new laws to protect you from
us and round us up so they can put us places where you don't have to see us.
Just walk right on by and don't even look at that heather; just pretend it
doesn't even exist; that's not a person, it's a BUM!!!!!!!
To a certain extent, during a hopefully temporary stage in the development of
free software, we average joes will need to trust. We very well may need to
STFU and leave it to the experts, but at least they will be our experts who
have already earned our trust long before things got this bad.
The average user will probably need to keep a Windows box or an eye pad or
something around just to avoid questions. Depending on their age and social
circles, it might be advantageous to feign ignorance in all technical
matters.
"I don't know because my son always takes care of that computer mumbo jumbo
and he's out of town right now so....REALLY??? So all I have to do is google
it and it will automatically install the app and I can pay my bill without
even having to put on my underpants and wait for the bus? Well, well, well,
what will they come up with next. I'll write that down to tell Junior since I
don't know what a google is, obviously, jajajajaja, here's your check and you
have a nice day, sonny!"
The price of that is anger.
It's nothing the human race hasn't done before and the free software
community can get through this too. Anger is best diverted into concrete
action so I think what we, as users, are going to need is something analagous
to what Amazon and the corps are doing with data miners: here is one simple
repetitive job that needs doing. X doesn't have the English skills so Y can
do it but s/he doesn't have enough Portugese to finish the job so Z can take
over from there.
We need AI to take care of the details and give human readable instructions
to stressed out angry fearful biological organisms. AI isn't going to get
their feelings hurt if the biological organism has to blow off a bit of steam
first before it can focus on the task at hand.
I also think there will be a huge influx of poorly self-taught and
half-functional half-programmers who will need to be dealt with tactfully and
allowed to grow at their own pace. The difference between a well written AI
and one dashed off in the middle of the night in frustration might make the
difference between whether they work for us or for them.
I can't copy and pace, but about fifteen years ago someone shared a story
with me about what their grandparents went through to get information during
WWII. There were underground newspapers. Even in the blazing hot summers,
people always read them in front of a cheerful dancing fire in their
fireplaces in case their was an unexpected knock on the door.
But they read them.
Average Joes risked their lives, properties, incomes, careers, and families
just to find out wtf was going on.
Average Joes aren't going to change in three or four lousy generations.
