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Zapier/IFTTT are the IKEA of the web. No code/low code environments where you can build cheap, janky digital furniture that breaks easily and is hard to move, but easy to assemble with an Allen wrench and a bureaucratic instruction manual.
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This is a problem I have a lot, where I can't find a tweet I saw or sent. What I ended up I'm very happy with. I use Zapier to capture every tweet I write/like or mentions me, and send it to a Slack channel. Slack has superb search. I also send ever liked Tweet to Trello board twitter.com/johncutlefish/…
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Consumer web s/w mapped to furniture Beta products: Half-done artisan furniture; carpenter may die before it’s done Paid SaaS: hotel furniture Ad-supported, closed: crates in slum-tents Ad-supported, open: IKEA (w/ IFTTT+Zapier) Managed-hosted: rental Hand-coded: self-built
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This is depressing. Pick 2 of 3 of web software/furniture for your digital life: 1. Affordable 2. Quality 3. Does what YOU want As with any consumer category, the only way to get all 3 is to become a producer to at least some degree. Ikea-level producer ability is minimum.
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The truth of “everyone must learn to code” depends on analogy you have in mind: “It’s like everyone must learn to... a) read/write” (wrong) b) fly planes” (wrong) c) drive” (partly right, for opsec behaviors) d) cook” (wish it meant this) e) assemble Ikea furniture” (most true)
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If you’ve done a few, you realize Ikea design has a standard, simple DIY vocabulary. Same types of fasteners etc. Learning those is like UI literacy.
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I’m saying the analogy between “everyone must learn to code” and “everyone must learn to read/write” is ill-posed. Coding ability is not a literacy.
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Wait... but... how does one learn to assemble Ikea furniture? Surely, you just get a manual and... do it. Which doesn't help you with any other piece of Ikea furniture, because you need a new, unique manual that comes with it. I was totally on board with the tweet until e)
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One perspective is to interpret any absolute statement someone makes as a 80/20 distribution. So in this context, about 80% of people should learn to code.