WriteLarge.com

We've been over this once already, but enough is enough Flickr. Uploader V. 3 is _still_ broken. I was annoyed with the mysterious and intermittent upload button, but this mysterious bombing out makes no sense to me.

And, although I lack the technical expertise to prove it to complete satisfaction, I get the feeling that, in spite of your cheeky little error message, it's not me that needs to "twiddle" with my cables.

When everything is working, that kind of informality is fun and charming, but when it's broke, it makes you look like an asshole. Seriously, Flickr, Couples break up over shit like this. TApps said it best. Stop Sucking.

I know it's totally 2007 to rip on the Flickr Uploader 3.x, but damn, this is totally broken.

Note that there is no Upload button anywhere on this screen shot. Where's the upload button? Nowhere. I had to take a photo out and drop it back in to make the upload button reappear.

I'm not sure how I made the upload button disappear, it has something to do with the wackadoo window that it brings up when you authorize the application.

It just makes me wonder, does anybody beta test anymore? Look, I'll admit it, I don't. But I'm not Yahoo.

So, I'm trying to make some changes to my Cingular/AT&T account. I can't log in and I end up locked out so I click the "Live Chat" button. The Chat Window teeny-tiny so I grabbed the corner of the browser window and lo! It doesn't resize anything.
Broken.
If I can't resize the window, disable the resize window please.

It gets better though. As I'm chatting with the lady, the window refreshes automatically and gets me this:

Nice.
So I shut down my whole browser, bring the page back up and try again:
Here's a clipping of the conversation:

Jamison: May I have the last four digits of her social security number?
Gabe: I don't know her social security number.
Jamison: I apologize, but I need that before I can assist you.
Gabe: I apologize, if I knew that, I wouldn't need you.

Do I have to point out how this is broken? Today It struck me as particularly broken, and given that today is Festivus, a day set aside for the airing of grievances, among other things.

I know that I am probably asking too much, but I wish that Amazon would spend less time telling me what else I should buy and instead create a teeny tiny script charged with noodling out that a "larger" image doesn't really exist. Don't show me the same image in a larger frame and pretend that it's larger. That just irritates me and confuses people who don't understand that Amazon isn't a store, it's an unintelligent collection of computer programs running in crystal box stuffed under Athena's bedroll.

Seriously, though. If I'm going to buy this incredibly awesome Kramerica Industries T-shirt, I need to know what the t-shirt says, and I'd like to get a good view of the artwork. The case for this Vandelay Industries shirt is even stronger, but at least the stupidity extends (and to be fair probably starts) at the source shop.

Clicking on the "See Larger Image" button should give you a higher resolution image, not just an embiggened version of the photo you've already seen. Here's a ridiculous brick-and-mortar analogy. Imagine asking for a clerk to get some jewelry out of the case so you can see it up closer, and the clerk dutifully hands you a 1/4 scale replica of the jewelry for you too look at.  It's not a question of bigness, it's a question of fidelity.

The file manager in cPanel, which you should really not use because your web browser shouldn't be your code-editor, in my opinion, has a bad set of buttons.

Look at the Upload and Download Buttons.

The Upload Button has an arrow pointing down. The Download button has an arrow pointing down. (Or presumably, at the user.)

It's not the Download button that is broken. It makes sense if you think that the download button is grabbing a file from the *world* wide web and bringing it down the pipes to you.

But the upload button isn't broken either. It makes sense if you think that they upload button is taking a file and putting it in the folder that you're currently working in, (The name of which is right below the downward pointing arrow.)

But when you put the two buttons together, neither one really makes sense.

Suggested fix: Just like in literature, UI's shouldn't mix metaphor. Pick one or the other.