donnacha's dashboard

Yeah, I set mine to 500 too, way more useful.

Copy HTML sounds useful for quick, temporary uses but I suspect that most people would, like me, not use images in a post if they can't be sure that it won't disappear or, worse, be replaced with something objectionable. Control is a must and the only way to achieve that is to upload images to your own server. – donnacha, on November 06, 2009 19:37

I understand the sensitivity but I would argue that the buck doesn't stop with you, the toolmaker.

Viewfinder, by making it easy to search by license, actually makes it easier for users to do the right thing. If they infringe licences, that is not your fault, anymore than it would be if they used Google Images or Flickr itself.

I would argue that, as a proper application, Viewfinder offers an additional time-saving that makes it more practical to obey the rules - I believe that many infringements occur simply because they are tired and it is taking them too long, too many page refreshes, to find a suitable image with a suitable license. As such, you should concentrate on making Viewfinder the best, most comprehensive search tool possible. – donnacha, on November 06, 2009 19:33

Wow, the time and trouble they could have saved if they had simply understood, from the beginning, how to communicate with their users.

Everything about this is outrageous.

Cultured Code's consistent refusal to even acknowledge the problems users were having had already marked them out as a company that simply does not understand customer relations in this Internet age.

Now deleting their forums and the thousands of posts, both positive and negative, contributed by users, simply shows that this is a company you cannot trust.

Think about it: what sort of company deletes an entire forum with over a year of posts? And what sort of person is so gutless that he tries to hide his real identity when posting here?

These people are dishonest to the tips of their fingers.

@StewBrennand

No, I am not Donncha, the Lead Developer behind WPMU, all we have in common are similar names ( Donncha / Donnacha) and the fact that we are both incredibly handsome and virile young Irishmen.

I am glad that you have stated that you appreciate the work that goes into services like ID but I disagree that you were merely airing your frustration - you specifically said that they were giving Automattic a bad name and that was a pretty low blow, hitting them where they work, precisely the sort of attack that causes people to wonder why they even bother.

A very, very important thing to remember is that coding is hard, running a service and dealing with user issues is hard, the whole thing is a grind with very few "up" moments to balance out all the downs. What keeps any developer going is the ambition to produce something that users love and which allows them to do things that were not possible before, but getting to that point takes a long time.

In recent years, an increasing number of users, of both Open Source software and related services such as ID, seem to have no concept of WHY developers devote so much time and passion into what they do. They don't do it because they desperately want to become your bitch, they don't do it so you can throw a hissy fit when they don't magically produce the features you want on exactly the schedule that you "need" them.

Now, again, I'm not saying any of this with the intention of insulting you personally, but it does have to be pointed out that drive-by tantrums like this are not appropriate and they certainly don't motivate anyone to address the issues you are concerned about. If you want to get things done, post feature suggestions but stay positive and explain politely why you thing they would be good.

Trust that developers WANT their product not to suck, they want their service to be successful but, at the end of the day, they are the ones who are investing their time, their lives and they must do their best to strike a balance that will suit the most users overall.

If an application or service does not suit your needs, accept that life sometimes disappoints. If you feel particularly strongly that a service is getting it wrong and that you have the understanding and taste necessary to see what they are missing, you should, absolutely, learn how to code and invest a few years into your dream because, if you are right, you will be very successful and the world will benefit from your insight. I'm not even joking, this is how mankind progresses. – donnacha, on July 30, 2009 00:48

No offense intended to StewBrennand but I would like to make it clear to Team ID that his ungrateful and insulting behavior towards you, the innovators behind a free and rapidly evolving service, is simply not representative of how your users feel about IntenseDebate.

The competition between Disqus and IntenseDebate, both excellent teams, has helped to drive us forward at high speed towards the dream of unified commenting. Disqus would not be as good as it is without IntenseDebate, and vice versa.

As is evidenced by my posts in this thread last year, I myself was disillusioned by the apparent lack of progress from ID but, then, you announced your plugin system which has such incredible potential. Disqus may seem to be ahead at the moment but plugins could change the whole game.

Either way, it is an exciting time to be a blogger and we are privileged to be the beneficiaries of all this innovation.

Keep up the good work! – donnacha, on July 29, 2009 23:52

So, any progress on this?

With so much competition in this niche, it surprises me that this feature still hasn't made it into Tweetie for Mac, such a useful feature on the iPhone version.

Yes, in terms of workflow, this would make a lot more sense then having to open up each link in my browser and save it using the Instapaper bookmarklet.