I Don't Like Dislike

Law #17:  You don't need a reason to like something.  You do however need a reason to NOT like something.

Ah the Facebook like.  Probably the most prolific currency on the Web to date.  To some it's worth more than money.  Heck there are even people willing to pay actual money for a like (not legal by the way so don't start thinking this is your new career opportunity).  Voting things up isn't exactly new on the Web though.  It's actually been around a long time.  But something about it always griped me.

As much as you hear that Facebook will someday give people the opportunity to "dislike" something, don't hold your breath on that one.  Their reasoning does make sense, but I'm against it for a much simpler one.  I don't think anyone should be allowed to express dislike for anything unless they can provide a logical and/or compelling argument why.  Yeah I know.  Blah blah blah America, blah blah blah first amendment.  That's all well and good, but simple dislike is really a rare emotion.  There's almost always a reason for dislike.  I don't like fish...because I'm allergic to it.  I don't like baseball...because I think the game is slow and boring.  See how that works?

The reason it's a problem for me (and for you too) is that people end discussions with "I don't like it" and that's it.  The end.  Imagine if every congressional bill ended with this (don't get me wrong, a lot of them still do).  If we don't understand why we don't move forward.  It's that simple. Naturally, discussion doesn't always change people's mind but at least we keep the conversation in play.  We have much to discuss.

This Isn't The Implementation You're Looking For

Law #16: Implementations should conform to your policy or give you a better one.

I know this one is kinda cryptic but hear me out.  Have you ever bought an appliance that was supposed to make your life easier and you find you have to rearrange the entire kitchen just to use it?  It's kind of like that.  If you implement something into your life, your job, your ecosystem and it totally screws up policies you had in place before this implementation showed up then perhaps this isn't the implementation you're looking for.  Unless of course your original policy was crap.  It's a simple test:  Does the implementation make things harder or more simple?

I say this as a tech and watching people implement sweeping systems without the proper focus testing.  Often these implementations forget to consider the most important element:  the human one.