Re: GNU Emacs raison d'etre

[Karl Fogel]

On 17 May 2020, Drew Adams wrote:
>> > I believe we'll make better decisions if we keep in
>> > mind that "friendly to newcomers" is not, in itself,
>> > the primary goal.
>> 
>> It's not like extreme user-friendliness was ever a
>> guiding principle here. :-)
>
>I disagree.  There is a difference between "extreme
>user-friendliness" - which I think is, and should be,
>a guiding principle here, and prioritizing "friendly
>to newcomers".

While "friendly to newcomers" means something on its own, "user-friendliness" 
only means something after one has characterized the users in question.  That's 
the main point I've been trying to make: that there is no such thing as a 
generic user, so we have to make decisions about which kinds of users to 
optimize for.

In most UI/UX conversations (not necessarily here, but on the Net in general), 
most of the time people unconsciously say "user-friendly" as a synonym for 
"easy for newcomers to pick up quickly" -- without realizing that it also 
implies "tends not to reward sustained investment", since these two qualities 
inevitably trade off.

So if we characterize our users as "those who see, or who have the potential to 
see, the value of making a sustained investment in their text manipulation 
environment", *then* yes, by all means Emacs should be user-friendly.  But if 
we're saying "user-friendly" in the colloquial sense that most people use the 
term in, then no, I think it would be a mistake for Emacs to aim for that.

Best regards,
-Karl