Calling people people. What’s in a name?

My IT service management professor once told the class “there are only two professions who have users: IT and drug dealers.” It’s interesting how the term “user” has become so prevalent in technology, but nowhere else. Certainly the term “customer” is better for a series organization (be it an internal IT group or a company providing technology services). “Customer” sounds better, and it emphasizes whose needs are to be met.

For a free Internet service, though, it’s not necessarily an apt term, if for no other reason than the rule of “if you’re not paying for it, you’re the product.” That’s why I find Facebook’s recent decision to call their users “people” interesting.

Sure, it’s easy to dismiss this as a PR move calculated to make people feel more comfortable with a company that makes a living off of the personal information of others. I don’t doubt that there is a marketing component to this, but that doesn’t make the decision meritless. Words mean things, and chosen the right word can help frame employees mindsets, both consciously and subconsciously.

In Fedora, contributors have been actively discussing names, both of the collected software (“products” versus alternatives) and the people involved (“contributors”, “developers”, “users”). Understanding what the general perception of these terms are is a critical part of selecting the right one (particularly when the chosen term has to be translated into many other languages). A clear definition of the people terms is a necessary foundation of trying to understand the needs and expectations of that group.

“People” may be too broad of a term, but it’s nice to see a major company forego the word “user”. Perhaps others will follow suit. Of course, “user” is just such a handy term that it’s hard to find a suitably generic replacement. Maybe that’s why it sticks around?

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