People Feel Loyalty To Computers

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...."

Comments

Uhhhhhh

[ev1lcanuck]

What I feel towards my Windows box is something other than loyalty....

Unrequited love

[rueger]

Sadly our computers seem less inclined to share that love...

"Open the pod bay door HAL...."

Re:Unrequited love

[lawngnome]

HAL wasnt evil, he just got really paranoid because they gave him a complete set of instructions to carry out the mission in the event that the humans failed and told him to lie about it, which because he was designed to provide accurate information caused the conflict... this is explained in 2010...
On a side note, is it just me or does the computer nerd that figures this out in the movie have something for hal? that long pause and "thank you hal..." at the end was creepy.

Re:Unrequited love

[tunabomber]

Bad example. HAL seemed to like Dave until he decided to deactivate HAL. Just imagine how your human love would react if she heard you were going to "deactivate" her... somehow I suspect she'd be a little less polite than saying "I'm sorry Dave, but I can't allow you to do that."

Re:Unrequited love

[Simonetta]

If she would be willing to open the pod bay door more often, then I'd be happy to activate her more often.

But they're all supposed to be equal...

[LostCluster]

In a college computer lab, all of the terminals in a group are supposed to be identical and interchangable. However, it seems like users are building up a trust relationship with the computer they've used sucessfully before rather than wanting to take the chance with a computer they haven't met yet. It's almost as if users are presuming that most unfamiliar computers will fail on them...

Re:But they're all supposed to be equal...

[value_added]

In Vegas you can witness the the same behaviour around slot machines. Maybe they know something the rest of don't?

Re:But they're all supposed to be equal...

[Amiga Lover]

I think there's a large amount of unconscious thought & actions going on with computer use, which may end up being a large part of what's happening here. Not the least of which is WHERE a machine is. I like corners, so I used to sit in the corner and use the 3 machines around there, but thats just me. Other people liked edges.

Add to that the subtle signals we pick up when using a machine. Usually there will be little idiosyncrasies in a group situation, where a dozen computers might all sound a little different. whine differently. have their volume set just a little different compared to others, and the ones people are used to, or perhaps even NOTICE this about will be the ones they're drawn to.

I think the unconscious thought thing applies a great deal to Macs, PCs, Linux boxes. The first time I touched a Linux machine which was supposed to be stable, I locked it up. Why? I don't know. I can only guess that its user (a cousin) had his definition of "stable" defined by the routine of uses he went through every time he booted it, and never came across the particular odd combo I did. I found my Windows machine at the time stable as well (Win 98) but it'd guarantee to lockup within a few hours of use by someone who isn't me. non consciously, I think I'd learned to avoid the things to do that would crash it.

Bet it's similar with OSX boxes. put a windows or linux user who's never touched one before in front of it and it'll bluescreen, kernel panic or beachball soon after use, until they also built up the internal map of what not to do.

Re:But they're all supposed to be equal...

[Spoing]

1. In a college computer lab, all of the terminals in a group are supposed to be identical and interchangable. However, it seems like users are building up a trust relationship with the computer they've used sucessfully before rather than wanting to take the chance with a computer they haven't met yet. It's almost as if users are presuming that most unfamiliar computers will fail on them...

I had the same problem with department groups. By contract with the primary customer, the subcontractors were told "no departmental 'ownership' of machines not in offices". That meant specifically no pictures, no knick-knacks, all documents locked up in another room when the worker goes home. No labels on machines.

Two things destroyed this idea;

IT never got out of firefighting mode to impose standards.

Departments and individuals immediately took the attitude "if I'm not here, others can use my machine" as if that would satisfy the contract requirements.

Reasons for why this does not work -- and many machines and people ended up being idle -- were basically;

Without being able to sit down anywhere (possible if IT did make that possible), people stopped trying to use just any machine and focused on one or a small group "in our area".

People would stop working if a specific -- "my machine" mentioned above -- was not available.

Add to this lack of customer interest and management, and this becomes a bit of meat to fight over when other tensions arise.

Re:But they're all supposed to be equal...

[LostCluster]

Actually, in Vegas, slot machines that look identical don't have to be. The key is in the PRNG (psuedo random number generator) chip installed in each. They don't have a "memory" of what they did last, but there are some PRNGs that are "looser" and "tigher" over time. Players can't exactly figure out where the looser machines are, however, because it'd take a large number of plays to notice a difference.

Loyalty to machines

[wkitchen]

If people can feel loyalty to something as unintelligent as an automobile, then it is not at all unexpected that they feel that way towards their computers.

Re:Loyalty to machines

[Anonymous Coward]

Automobiles are like dogs. They let us down sometimes, they misbehave at inconvenient moments, and we're sometimes angry at them for being a nuisance. But for the most part they're loyal to us. And we love them more than the neighbor's even if the neighbor's is prettier.

Computers are like cats. They're cute when they're brand new and purring along. After six months you realize they're useless and plotting to kill you. You want to kick the stupid thing out the window.

Wow

[sydb]

This could lead to an over dependence on electronically-generated news and information.

Ground breaking stuff for slashdot.

next! <hits CTRL-R>

The real secret

[Anonymous Coward]

People given the option of a range of PCs tended to have favourites, with some even prepared to wait in line to use a particular machine.

Now we know which one had the hidden stash of pr0n!

Computers and Fashion

[Anonymous Coward]

All I know is, my computer has a much better fashion sense than this guy from Penn State...

(plaid on plaid! I mean einstein could do it, but that ain't exactly the same!)

People like sitting in the same place

[LostCluster]

In most college classrooms, professors don't particularly care to assign seats to anybody, yet students for the most part tend to seat themselves in more-or-less the same positions anyway. I wonder if this is related to want to have a favorite seat in the computer room.

Re:People like sitting in the same place

[cscx]

students for the most part tend to seat themselves in more-or-less the same positions anyway

You're right -- it's usually "right behind the hot blond chick."

Re:People like sitting in the same place

[BarryJacobsen]

The human does this, naturally.

And the human speak the English in the person of the third.

Re:People like sitting in the same place

[kf6auf]

At Caltech, we have sit-down dinners that are waited by students. Recently thought, Dining Services introduced the possibility of eating elsewhere once a week so often fewer people come to dinners. As a result, on these nights of low attendance, we pick a couple of tables to not set. It is really much fun to watch the people who always sit at these tables go "Ah! My seat!? Where do I sit?" On the other hand, it easier to wait if you know where everyone is sitting because you don't need to wonder where to find someone.

Don't piss them off....

[ThrudTheBarbarian]

Don't anthropomorphize computers. They hate it when you do that.

Re:I know what they mean

[LostCluster]

Just be careful... I've seen some Macintoshes go into a state of suicidial depression. First they start being sad all of the time, and when they're sad they're demanding attention before they'll work again. Then they start pulling bombs out of nowhere...

More Information Is Required

[ZPO]

I don't think we have enough information to draw conclusions based on the article.

- Do the computers that folks were willing to wait for have additional applications loaded?

- Are they perhaps known to be the most stable ones out of a given set?

- Did different machines have different monitors, keyboards, and mice?

- Are they in a location that makes them more desireable (lighting, temperature, lack of people, etc)

There are plenty of factors that influence choices such as this. Unless they took steps to ensure that the computers were 100pct identical in every way, the conclusions they have reached are suspect. The extrapolations they make about people blindingly trusting computers even more so.

A computer is a tool. Just like an artisan may have a favorite tool for a task a user may have a favorite computer for a task. I don't see anything too earth-shattering here.

Re:More Information Is Required

[LostCluster]

I'd also like to see what would happen if one night the computer room was rearraged quietly. Would people go looking for their "favorite" machine, or just use the one that had inherited the favorite's location?

Re:More Information Is Required

[glpierce]

I have a feeling that they'd just do the same thing they did originally - find a computer that works without problems and stick with it. My experience (at univerisities in both the UK and US) is that hardware can drive choice. Floppy drives and audio jacks don't hold up well to abuse, and are the first to go. Some machines have network problems, and some (depending on security) may have different programs or even personal files. Additionally, most computer labs tend to run Windows, which gradually begins to fail depending on its use.

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.

Ulysses Ship... err Computer

[WombatControl]

Of course, this also presents an interesting conundrum. My current computer has had every single part replaced since I bought the first iteration way back in 1998. 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? Or is it really some kind of sinister imposter only pretending to be my computer?

the world as they know it

[Alien54]

Prof Sundar said there computer manufacturers and advertisers could learn from the results of the study. In general, computers are marketed as things that can easily be phased out and replaced.

"A better advertising strategy might be to portray computers as something durable and reliable, something that grows with you," Prof Sundar told BBC News Online.

they can't do that. No, seriously.

This means that the industry would have to get off the treadmill of constant upgrades. It is no secret that MS is upset with the slow rate of people upgrading to XP. Most people now only upgrade when there is a definite need for it.

This would be the end of the world as they know it, and I feel fine.

Names?

[QEDog]

How many people name their computers? I do, and it takes me a bit to figure out names for them. I refer to them by their name usually, which causes my non-geeky friends to stare at me. Any one else does this compulsively? What is the name of your computer?

Re:Names?

[thelenm]

Yep, currently I'm typing on Gandalf the laptop and dinking around on Pippin the Pocket PC, accessing the Internet through Sauron the wireless access point and Aragorn the firewall, while my wife plays games on Eowyn the PC, my daughter plays games on Gimli the other PC, and Samwise the web server silently does his job in the background. Legolas the old web server lies disemboweled on the floor after an unfortunate shield-sledding accident.

Re:Names?

[/dev/trash]

Anyone with more than one PC names their computer. How else do you keep networked machines separated in your head?

News Dependence

[wkitchen]

From the article:

"We increasingly view computers as sources of information not just mediums of information. We attribute social characteristics and treat them as autonomous," said the professor.

This could lead to an over dependence on electronically-generated news and information.

The tendency to treat computers as human could lead to people favouring or even blindly accepting computer-generated information, to the point of depending on it over superior alternatives, warned Prof Sundar.

I think Prof. Sundar is overreaching a bit on this point. First of all, I don't personally know anyone who doesn't readily understand that news on cnn.com comes from CNN, not from inside their computer, any more than they'd think that news on TV originates inside their television. Second, I don't see it as much of a problem if people depend more on computers (by "computers" here I really mean the information resources that can be accessed through them, primarily the Internet) than on other sources of information. Often computers are the "superior alternative". You just have to use good judgement and keep your baloney detection kit in good working order, just as you should do with any other source of information.

I visited my public library just yesterday. And I can assure you that there is plenty of bunk there too.

Re:naming

[Little Brother]

Having managed a computer lab before, I can say that the behavior of naming computers is VERY handy, especialy when one computer might change roles or you might have redundant computers for a single role. Instead of having to explain "I mean the old server, that is currently not acting as the server, but will again" or "The third workstation from the right, that's my right, your left." or somesuch you can simply say "Rocky" or "Janet" and easily differentiate which system we're dealing with. (No my boss never realized I named all the computers after characters from "Rocky Horror Picture Show")

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:This is a suprise?

[Snork Asaurus]

People feel irrational loyalty to operating systems too.

In the case of Windows, it's more likely to be Stockholm Syndrome than loyalty.

Good Info for Techies perhaps

[djplurvert]

Techies should keep this in mind when dealing with their users. Good "computerside" manner really helps to ease users minds, make them feel comfortable with the CHANGES you are making, and getting them to (god I hate this term) "buy-in" to the ideas you are presenting. When you need support from these employees later it will be easier to come by if you have thought of their relationships with their workspaces.

I, and I suppose most techies, just think of a computer as a box of parts readied to be dumped as soon as any new piece of equipment comes along. The biggest pain to me is getting the configuration, not the data, moved from the old to the new. Users, on the other hand, don't have such an intimate knowledge of the inside of their machines and become attached to certain behaviours/modes of operation because they have attached those behaviours to ideas that they rely on.

They say things like, "After you boost the rams how will I get to word." One can either respond smugly, or, one can give the user words that make them comfortable. Of course upgrading ram will, at least in most cases, not affect things like access to applications. Instead of trying to educate the user with a technical diatribe simply say "This shouldn't affect your access to word, but we'll make absolutely sure before I leave, how's that?"

Of course this is slashdot, and I'm preaching to the choir. Given that I've seen SO MANY techs who don't recognize that a human touch would be beneficial to them, however, I felt a need to rant a bit.

plurvert

Re:Good Info for Techies perhaps

[AeroIllini]

One can either respond smugly, or, one can give the user words that make them comfortable.
**snip**
Of course this is slashdot, and I'm preaching to the choir.

I'm not so sure you are. In my experience, I've found that the majority of people who are exceptionally good with computers, such as the general population of Slashdot, simply do not understand the mentality of someone who is not technically inclined. To the novice computer users (and I'm speaking mostly about Windows and Macintosh users here -- the vast majority of Linux users are not novices) a computer is so complex and so powerful that it seems almost like magic. It is a completely new world to them, and it can be a little frightening and/or intimidating, but they plow ahead anyway because this thing is supposed to be easy to use. They really have no intuition regarding how things work. To use your example from above: RAM. Ask a novice computer user what RAM does, and they will likely tell you that it makes their computer faster, or that it gives their computer more memory (and when they say "memory" they are really referring to "disk space" -- many people cannot distinguish the two). Us techies have intuition regarding RAM. We know how it's used as temporary space for running processes and such, and we understand how most of that works on a fundamental level, even if we don't actually hard-code memory locations in our programs. So asking if adding RAM to their machine will affect other areas is a valid question -- they've been told by other people that RAM "makes their computer faster"... i.e., it affects the entire machine. Most techies I know, since the definition of RAM is so basic to them, will usually respond, at first, with astonishment at the supposedly stupid question (even if they don't express it out loud). Many will express astonishment verbally and say something smug, like, "No, of course not," as if they were reminding the user that 2+2 is indeed 4.

The vast majority of computer users think they know how computers work; so when they ask what we perceive as "stupid questions" they are merely trying to reconsile all the conflicting views of their computers they have gotten from various sources. What the technical community has to learn is how to explain computers to novices without slipping into techspeak, without overwhelming them with information they don't need to know, without condescending, and with the idea that these people are not as passionate about computers as the techie.

I see a lot of people on Slashdot getting frustruated with "supid users," usually because the users ask what the techie hears as "stupid questions." So I issue a challenge to the technically inclined: if you are unable to explain to a novice how a basic part of the computer works (like the video card) without diving into techincal details the user doesn't care about or talking down to them, then you are bogged down in details and need to step back to see the big picture. You don't know how something works unless you can explain it to a five-year-old.

It is in our nature to do this...

[uptownguy]

Humans have always felt a close relationship with the tools they use to get their work done. We have unearthed hunters from many thousands of years ago who were buried with their tools. You see people feel a kinship with their (book collection/music collection/car/favorite pair of jeans/lucky lighter/favorite pen) -- It appears to be in our nature to anthropomorphize things that we frequently interact with or associate with ourselves. We become accustomed to the particular quirks of these objects. The noises they make. The little things that need to be done to allow them to operate optimally. Why would computers be any different? I don't have a bow and arrow but I use my Sony Vaio every day to do my work. Human nature doesn't change just because the tools have...

Just my two cents...

my computers love me

[SanityInAnarchy]

I have Linux on all my computers, and they are all very obediant -- not because I've beaten them into submission, but because we are very intimate with one another. They know the darkest websites I visit, and I know their most hackish source code.

This is what happens when you start giving them names:

My desktop is called "Morpheus", and my laptop is called "Trinity". My fileserver is "Tank", and my router is "Ninja". I have had a healthy dose of male bonding with all but Trinity, who is the sexiest little notebook I've ever seen. Every now and then, I compile kernels for a little male bonding, or get down and dirty with Trinity's video drivers.

The only other computer in this house is called "Dad", which is dual-boot Windows/Linux, and I have a more love/hate relationship with it. Dad is like a Jeckyll and Hyde, and will change with a single reboot from the nicest gentleman to the sickest, most twisted machine.

But really, if your computers don't love you, have you considered that it's because you don't treat them right?