my one "thing i hate about twitter" post
i personally loathe posts about twitter, esp of the "things i hate about twitter" variety. it's all very boring and overplayed. however, i'm allowing myself one, so if you also hate these please ignore me.
i hate how easy it is for even friends to read assumptions into things despite me actively trying to be as diplomatic as possible. this is certainly not the only time this has happened but this is what specifically caused me to feel this way tonight: a ragebait-y post on reddit blew up about how github sucks from a layman's perspective. i do not like the post in question, as it's far too mean and is arguing something i do not agree with, which is that github authors are being jerks when they don't give you compiled versions of their programs.
i, me, vivi voltysquirrel last name, me understands that that is not fair. i do not and have never believed that hobbyists, small teams, developers of any kind (who are the people github is meant for and should always be so!) have to do anything beyond share their code. i respect any dev who shares any bit of their work, be it raw code or, god willing, compiled binaries.
despite this, i do think that github could make minor ux tweaks that could make it easier for non-developers to find what they need, which 99% of the time is simply the releases page. i've seen multiple people who don't know what they're doing spend multiple minutes trying to find where to find the 7z file that the project author kindly distributed. while i can understand the frustration and resistance to treating github as anything beyond a repository of code, collaboration tool, etc., it has become a platform that increasingly is necessary for non-developers to learn how to use.
i agree that it is truly "not that hard" to find a releases page. however, like many "not that hard" things in life, sometimes that's still too hard for some. what i advocate for is clearer sign posting to that releases page. a big green button. a splash of yellow paint, as it were. it would, at the very least, make my life easier, so i don't have to walk my stoner friend through the process to download the fix for her new game not working step-by-step.
despite this, i understand that people might not want this. i get it, i truly do. developers don't get nearly the respect they deserve, so i can understand how this could be interpreted as me saying "give me download button that spits out the thing i want". this is precisely why i said that's not what i was saying. i couldn't have been more diplomatic and conciliatory if i tried. and despite, multiple friends assumed something else.
the only time i've ever wanted long tweets in my life is when i feel like i have to explain myself so i don't get misconstrued, which is something that i personally cannot stand. it genuinely, truly ruins my mood and makes me depressed when i feel like people are not listening to me and assuming i'm saying something i'm not. i don't like feeling like i'm arguing with a friend, i loathe feeling like i have to defend myself from assumptions of my knowledge or intentions behind what i'm saying.
this is ultimately what the people who say that you can't have an honest discussion on twitter mean. even two people who like each other seemingly can't disagree in a way that doesn't feel confrontational. i'll admit, this is my fault for feeling the need to comment, my inability to just walk away from a discussion, my failing to not get emotional over an ultimately meaningless discussion that realistically has zero chance of actually changing anything. but it still sucks, man. i hate feeling so stupid as to get actually upset over stuff like this.