Backseat Software ⇥ blog.mikeswanson.com

Mike Swanson:

And yet, this is how a lot of modern software behaves. Not because it’s broken, but because we’ve normalized an interruption model that would be unacceptable almost anywhere else.

I’ve started to think of this as backseat software: the slow shift from software as a tool you operate to software as a channel that operates on you. Once a product learns it can talk back, it’s remarkably hard to keep it quiet.

You have heard about this stuff before, but Swanson’s piece is not mere repetition. There is history, and reasonable suggestions on how to correct the current oft-miserable state of software.