This week’s Alertbox column claims that User Education Is Not the Answer to Security Problems:
Internet scams cannot be thwarted by placing the burden on users to defend themselves at all times. Beleaguered users need protection, and the technology must change to provide this.
Some interesting parallels to library user education in the age of "Don’t make me think."
don’t make me be an expert
The story is interesting, but I don’t really like the somewhat snide tone in the original post here, describing the age of “don’t make me think.” It’s not a matter of people not thinking. It’s a matter of having so complicated a world, no one can know everything. Why have computer “experts” supposedly trained in that niche and then whine that users don’t know anything? Isn’t knowing about computers (or libraries, medicine, law or anything else that employs trained professionals) the expert’s job, not the user’s? Seems to me the whole point of our society is to all have different strengths and work together so no one person has to know everything… and with that in mind, I’m very tired of hearing “experts” in various fields make remarks about the great ignorant unwashed. The writer of the article that is linked to apparently feels the same way, but the same cannot be said for the one who posted this link and made the “don’t make me think” comment.
“don’t make me think”
is the title of a usability book by Steve Krug, who argues for more common-sense design. And I’m not aware of anyone in the usability field that doesn’t acknowledge that people follow the principle of least effort.
Once you’ve done the best job making things user-friendly, it’s a question of where you draw the line of personal responsibility and autonomy. By the innuendo in the story above you can probably tell I lean towards the “teach a man to fish…” school of thought.