drew olanoff dot com.

Ok, that's it. The next time I hear the word "User"...

As I’ve mentioned a few times, one of the biggest things that bothers me about companies/startups/big fancy tech people is how they refer to folks as “users”. 

“We have 1,000,000 users”, as if the people who come to their site are crackheads.

I’m ending this once and for all.  The word we should use is “guest”.   “ReadBurner averages XXXXXX guests a day”.   “Our guestbase is growing and growing since March”.

Users, User, Userbase, whatever.  Lets let it go.   It’s 2008.  Lets show some respect to the people who are coming to the things we work hard on.

When someone knocks on my door, comes in and chills out, do I call them a user at my house?  I don’t think I’ve ever twittered “I have 5 users at my house tonight, woohooo!”

At my wedding, I’m going to have 200 guests.   Not 200 users.

People are guests on our sites, apps, and platforms.   Lets not only treat them as such, but refer to them as such.  We’re lucky to have them stay a while.

Enough is enough, this isn’t 1995 anymore.