I believe you're underestimating just how poor the "average user"s understanding is of what's going on in "their" computers... they literally have no concept of "where" their photos/email/etc. is stored or backed up: in the cloud, on device, synchronised,... it's just a single black box. They literally have NO mental model of that.
A personal domain? They have no idea how to do that, no understanding of why you'd want to do that outside of "marketing reasons" (which don't apply to the vast majority,) wouldn't know what to do with one should they obtain one, and would not be capable of managing said domain once they have it.
Don't believe me? Go and look at an ordinary user's email inbox. ALL the emails they've ever sent/received are sitting there. Filing/folders? They've no idea what those are or how to use them. If an email makes it into a folder (by mistake: fat-fingered or a misclick of the mouse) it's GONE for them. Literally no idea that it might still be around, and still less notion of how to go looking for it. So every email ever sits "safely" in the inbox and "search" is a linear eyeball scan by date.
I little teaching? I believe not. A lot of teaching? Perhaps. Might have some small effect, and even then you'll not get through to a large minority. This is not intended to dis those people or imply that they're stupid -- far from it -- just that they've never developed/been taught the mental skills these sorts of abstractions demand, and there's no way to make that happen at scale. It's a massive, persistent, pervasive UI/UX failure, and a pisspoor reflection on our "industry"s priorities.
> I believe you're underestimating just how poor the "average user"s understanding is of what's going on in "their" computers... they literally have no concept of "where" their photos/email/etc. is stored or backed up: in the cloud, on device, synchronised,... it's just a single black box. They literally have NO mental model of that.
It's probably something that should be taught in schools, early-on, when people have the neurological flexibility to absorb it. Sure, the technology will change after you get out of school, but I'm pretty damn old, and filesystems and the client/server model haven't changed a whole lot since I was in middle school. When I was in school, they didn't really have computer classes, and I think the generation after me basically got "how to use Microsoft Word", when what we all really needed was education in the fundamentals.
A personal domain? They have no idea how to do that, no understanding of why you'd want to do that outside of "marketing reasons" (which don't apply to the vast majority,) wouldn't know what to do with one should they obtain one, and would not be capable of managing said domain once they have it.
Don't believe me? Go and look at an ordinary user's email inbox. ALL the emails they've ever sent/received are sitting there. Filing/folders? They've no idea what those are or how to use them. If an email makes it into a folder (by mistake: fat-fingered or a misclick of the mouse) it's GONE for them. Literally no idea that it might still be around, and still less notion of how to go looking for it. So every email ever sits "safely" in the inbox and "search" is a linear eyeball scan by date.
I little teaching? I believe not. A lot of teaching? Perhaps. Might have some small effect, and even then you'll not get through to a large minority. This is not intended to dis those people or imply that they're stupid -- far from it -- just that they've never developed/been taught the mental skills these sorts of abstractions demand, and there's no way to make that happen at scale. It's a massive, persistent, pervasive UI/UX failure, and a pisspoor reflection on our "industry"s priorities.