Photoshop 6

Yesterday I loaded Photoshop 6.0 and was reminded of a discussion several of us had about online newspapers during the New Directions for News workshop at Stanford in May. We were asking each other for examples of industries or companies that really respond to their customers or users -- companies that newspapers might learn from, if they wanted to improve their products.

In that group of newspaper people, we discussed a couple of software companies: Adobe and Macromedia. Maybe I was the most vocal, because I am one happy customer, and here's why: Every time I install a new version of an Adobe or Macromedia product that I have been using for a while, I am PLEASED with the new version. They have made improvements that actually help me do my work better -- so of course I'm happy! (And I hate spending time learning new software.)

The question is, How do they manage to do this? They must be talking to real users (like me) -- and making careful decisions based on what they hear from those users. One of the reasons I'm very, very happy with Photoshop 6.0 was that I was worried that they would have changed a lot of things in ways that would force me to relearn things I knew from 5.5 -- making me waste a lot of time. WRONG! There were a couple of things (like, I couldn't find the paint bucket for a while), but overall, I don't feel that I have to relearn stuff I already knew. This is very important for users. When you change a product, the changes should make life better for the users -- not more difficult.