A Turing complete user

I like to consider myself a Turing complete user. This is a concept I discovered in a fascinating essay written by Olia Lialina on the concept of users in computing, and the trend best embodied by Apple to destroy users and all they stand for.

I guess on of the reasons I liked the article is that I totally recognise myself in this concept of Turing complete user. But I also find a little bit sad that this is not a widespread species.

“A scientist of the Future” Title picture of Vanevar Bush’s “As we make think” from Life magazine, 1945

But I can’t believe it’s going to stay that way indefinitely. Eventually maybe people are going to stop putting up with how bad their computers respond to them and start doing something about it. Maybe Jan-Christoph should start a series: “I hate technology.”

I just noticed how it’s funny that [Jan’s homepage][jcborh] currently features a collage of pictures taken for 24 hours while he was wearing a camera on his chest. Do you see the resemblance with the picture chosen by Olia to represent the user?

One step towards this is this excellent project, Revealing errors.

Anyway, I encourage you to read the essay or if that’s more your style there’s a video from the last CCC in Hamburg:

Turing Complete User What can be done to protect the term, the notion and the existence of the Users?

Direct link to the video

Related: the user data manifesto (my draft for version 2, feedback welcome)

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