Post #2330120

2026-04-25 13:14 UTC

@larsmb@mastodon.online If you find it has utility for something, it's the "something" that you have found, not the "utility" What you need is for that "something" to be taken as a fixed purpose for which the best methods to satisfy it are deliberated over. Resulting in a product which *the maker* can assert is created to satisfy the specific purpose. That's why these things are so popular for crime, it's a purpose that is not expected to be openly asserted as the purpose it was created for.

Replies (2)

@fasterandworse@hci.social 2026-04-25 13:35

@larsmb@mastodon.online If you find an apple watch useful for monitoring a medical condition you have found that it would be useful to have a 24/7 method for monitoring a medical condition. When you credit that "use case" to the apple watch, you legitimise everything else it does (and can potentially do) This is not a position of privilege, it's a position of pushing for and expecting products which take real purposes seriously and not legitimising See-what-you-can-do-with-this-as-a-Service for free

Open ##2330121
@wilbr@glitch.social 2026-04-25 15:22

@fasterandworse@hci.social @larsmb@mastodon.online half the goal of modern technology is to create general purpose wizardry boxes which not even the inventors could've foreseen, so while I agree with OP I think there's heavy caveats and you can't extend it very far. Consider the Sinclair vs Apple II home computers. One was a box of blinking lights, the other inspired and taught generations. Inventors create, and customers find unexpected uses for it (for better, or often worse.) Duct tape only rarely fixes ducts anymore.

Open ##2330125