People Feel Loyalty To Computers 476
stoobthealien writes "According to BBC News researchers have discovered that people have loyalty to specific computers because of a tendancy to associate "human attributes to them" - and I thought it was just me that speaks to my PC...."
But they're all supposed to be equal... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ha! (Score:2, Interesting)
I know, I'm a nerd.
Re:More Information Is Required (Score:5, Interesting)
Computer lab seating (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:But they're all supposed to be equal... (Score:5, Interesting)
As my economics professor explained (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sure I'm not the only one that has certain places I prefer to sit. I'm comfortable with the view, etc, that they provide. Computers are simply an extension of that.
particularly computers associated with victories (Score:3, Interesting)
However, I am loathe to give it up because that's the machine that I played and beat Dark Forces on when I was in graduate school. (After my qualifying exams, I went home and played DF for about 4 days straight. Ah--those were the days!)
Re:Ulysses Ship... err Computer (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course, not everything was replaced at the same time, but rather a gradual process of upgrades over the years. So, is it really the same computer I started with?
Your computer is not the only one that has undergone a "gradual process of upgrades" over time. Your body is not the same one you had a few years ago, or even a few hours ago for that matter... And don't forget the rather fickle and ever-changing mind, too.
Re:Other explanations (Score:2, Interesting)
News Dependence (Score:5, Interesting)
I visited my public library just yesterday. And I can assure you that there is plenty of bunk there too.
Computer #12 (Score:2, Interesting)
Where I work, there are patrons who frequent a particular machine (#12) because it has exhibited features that the other machines don't seem to have. It played streaming audio when the other machines didn't. It was more stable and it was also in the back row. So that's stability, features, and location.
On the other hand, when I teach at the same place, I encourage people to name their computers. With beginners who are intimidated by machines, I always felt it was better if the machines had a name (other than their numbers). In the end, I suppose that could promote loyalty as it's easier to come back to a named machine than not.
Re:naming (Score:5, Interesting)
Those habits have been very usefull outside the lab and at other jobs but mostly when dealing with my parents. They have several computers and sometimes I have to troubleshoot over the phone. As they sometimes forget they switched locations of a coutple of computers since last I was there, it is VERY handy that I've gotten them to refer to computers by name (in this case we're using a Norse God Pantheon naming scheme, not Rocky).
Re:More Information Is Required (Score:2, Interesting)
I like the machines close to the end of an aisle that give me the best overall view of the room; i hate sitting with my back to the door or the rest of the room. It's not a matter of which machine is better because they're (idiot proof, but only the idiots can break them) all the same.
They may just find that users were gravitating to machines based on personal preference; some users like to have their back to the rest of the room to avoid other distractions, some like to be near the door.
Re:But they're all supposed to be equal... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:People like sitting in the same place (Score:4, Interesting)
From time to time the technicians would swap machines around, and nobody really noticed. Users really preferred to sit at the front of the labs next to the door so they could reach the printers quickly. As a consequence the bad keyboards (sticky keys), used to get bubble sorted to the back of the lab. These were eventually replaced with the quietkey keyboards.
The most popular machines were those that were closest to the radiators, at the front of the room and quietkey keyboards. The most unpopular machines were those that were closest to the windows and/or had bad keyboards.
Re:More Information Is Required (Score:5, Interesting)
I actually recall a library at a UK university which had two computers with 1024x768 resolution and high color quality, while the rest (about 25) were at lower resolutions and lower color settings. I was working on graphics at the time, so you can guess how useful most of the computers were. I'd sit down at a random computer and check email and read news until someone got off of one of the good PCs. There were a few terminals which consistantly crashed, and I simply wouldn't use.
Simply put, it's a matter of trust and reputation - if a computer works well consistantly, I stick with it. The odds of finding another "good" one is unfortunately low.
Nothing new here (Score:4, Interesting)
But once a company tries to leverage it's market by playing on the established loyalty (i.e. coaxing Commodore 64 users to all gewt Amigas or long time mac OS Mac users to all switch to OS X) they may hurt their reputation even worse, as a loyal customer scorned they are in a good position to voice their opinions.
Re:But they're all supposed to be equal... (Score:4, Interesting)
Not so surprising. I think the rationale is along the lines of "This machine has to spew out a lot of money at SOME point in its existence. So the longer I stay with this one, the more my odds go up that I'll be the one who pulls the lever at the right time." They feel that if they go around to other machines, they'll catch them at different points in their lives and have lower risk of winning.
I'd like to think that people are stupid about this, but I have to be honest, it's exactly the strategy I'd employ.
Re:Names? (Score:3, Interesting)
as an example, at my old firm, our main ldap/smb, ypserv and nfs server i named 'MOTHER', from the main computer in the original Alien movie. how appropriate too, that IBM Netfinity system really took care of our developers. Mother had an uptime of 378 days when our company decided to move our office. the new office was 20 miles away, and we contemplated keeping the machine on during the move as to not lose the uptime (we had a decent UPS).
in the end, we decided to shut her down during the transfer. as of today, she has 286 days. what a machine!
it appears that many sysadmins adopts some sort of naming theme, like calling each system after the name of a jet, or after southpark characters. i don't like this idea; each system really has it's own function and it should be aptly named in this regard.
boy, Mother sure was a good system. i really miss her.
Re:Uhhhhhh (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't know. The more flawed the system, the more I find myself nostalgicaly cherishing it for its flaws, in the way one looks back in foolish nostalgia on what were at the time the most irritating aspects of a relationship.
For example, I think I have more affection for my TI 99/4A [ystig.com] (why else would I regularly take pictures of it) than for any other system, all the more so due to its terrible system architecture (16-bit CPU with everything but 256 bytes of CPU RAM on an 8-bit bus), and due to the irritation of trying to get games running off of what is sometimes an infuriating cart+casette combo.
You really value and develop a relationship with your system when it takes genuine effort to get the bloody software working (e.g., off of casettes, and sometimes having to type it out manually in line number BASIC).
Wow, so it isn't just me (Score:4, Interesting)
far fetched? (Score:3, Interesting)
As far as loyalty for a brand, that could be seen as well, but I see brand loyalty brighten and fade along with the president's approval rating. It's fickle. Just as an example I've moved loyalty from one graphics card manufacturer to the next over the years, neither one can keep making "great" cards, for some reason they are all doomed to be taken over by a start up it seems. It wasn't long ago ATI was the "kiddie" version and 3DFX had a corner on the market.
But for arguments sake, lets just read the brands i have slathered on my monitor in the form of stickers, case badges and markings of my own:
ATARI
Abit
Antec
Zalman
Needless to say i've got some "loyalty" to a few brands.
Re:Good Info for Techies perhaps (Score:3, Interesting)
I was in a talk a couple of years ago and the speaker was Jim Gray (winner of the turing award in 1998) and he also said something along these lines... as a researcher, you have a clear picture of what you are doing if you can easily explain your research to your partner (assuming of course that your partner is not in your field and assuming that he/she understands your explanation).
Is it loyalty or habit? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:People like sitting in the same place (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:This is a suprise? (Score:4, Interesting)
A relevant quote on the subject [sniggle.net]:
Jokes always seem funnier to me when I don't get them at first reading -- yeah, I actually did have to look up "Stockholm Syndrome."
Is this really about computers? (Score:1, Interesting)