Seesmic Desktop: When Bad Updates Happen To Great Software
Earlier this morning, I loaded up Seesmic Desktop and was greeted with a pop-up window informing me that a new build of the software, version 0.7, was available. I like Seesmic Desktop a lot, and I like updates, so I happily clicked on the button to proceed.
Ten minutes later, I’d made the decision to roll back to my previous installation of Seesmic Desktop, and in this article I’m going to tell you why.
1. It Defaults To Twitter’s Rebuild Of the Retweet
Seesmic Desktop 0.7 replaces the old-style, organic retweet (RT @, via etc), which many of us have come to know and love, with Twitter’s ill-advised, controversial and poorly-implemented Project Retweet system.
I don’t like these new-style retweets for a number of reasons, and consequently rarely use them, and now I find that in the latest build of Desktop the software defaults to the new kind of retweet. Seesmic has added a feature to the software which lets you retweet organically using a new function called ‘quotes’, but that now takes two clicks to activate, instead of just one as before. That might seem trivial, but this extra step means everything takes twice as long. I’ve also built a habit of just clicking on the retweet button, which is something I would have to start to undo.
Yes, I could switch over completely to the new-style retweet, but given how tweets submitted in this way rarely even show up in people’s streams or mentions folders the majority of the time (certainly when using clients), I would consider that yet another step backwards.
Seesmic have added a way to view the new-style retweets in their own pane, including where this method has been used by others to retweet something you have submitted, which is a good idea in theory. But as it doesn’t give credit to the retweeter – all you see is a list of tweets that you have made – it’s really quite useless.
2. The Buttons On The Accounts Pane Have Been Removed
This one was the real deal-breaker for me. Previous installations of Seesmic came with a really neat function that gave you check access to your home feed, mentions, direct messages, sent messages, favourites and search.
You accessed this by simply clicking on your username in the left sidebar. I really, really loved this functionality, and being completely honest it was the one thing that kept me going back to Desktop again and again. And now it’s gone.
Like many, I own and regularly use a netbook and the smaller screen means I’m quite fussy about how many panes I want open in my software. I like three panes – one on the left for my choice of list, the accounts pane in the middle, and a search pane on the right.
The buttons on this account pane meant that I could happily do everything I wanted within Twitter using just three panes in Seesmic Desktop. With the new software, I’d need to have a nightmarish eight panes open to get the exact same functionality. And five of them would always be off the screen, meaning endless use of the scrollbar, which is really, really annoying.
People Hate Change
Yes they do, and you’ll have to accept my apology if all of this comes across as a whine or a rant. In the scheme of things, none of this really matters. Things change, some people complain, and life moves on.
But while software has to evolve and develop if it is going to move forward, I believe it’s always important to give existing customers as much choice as possible. Instead of just replacing the retweet functionality, they should have given us the choice.
You know, like TweetDeck did.
As to why they removed the buttons from the accounts pane, I have absolutely no idea. I’m hoping it’s a bug or glitch in the new build and it will soon return, as without it there’s very little to keep Seesmic Desktop as my number one choice of Twitter client.
It’s all so upsetting, I even installed TweetDeck again. Briefly.
Thankfully, I’d kept previous installations of Seesmic Desktop on my netbook, and so I rolled back to version 0.6.3, which was the last build that did everything I wanted. I’ve included a link to this below if you decide you’d rather have old-style retweets and the fully-functional accounts pane, too.
Important Note: If you roll back to a previous version of Seesmic, it will completely overwrite your existing version, and you will lose all configuration, including panes and API setup, and any lists you have made (within Seesmic – it won’t affect Twitter lists).
I encourage you try out the latest build and make up your own mind. There’s every chance that the things that are important to me are meaningless to you. You can always roll back, as I did.
I’m hoping this is a temporary oversight from Seesmic and the next version of the software will be a little bit more accommodating to the existing userbase. Seesmic has a great team, and the @askseesmic account on Twitter is fantastic, and this is less of a moan about those guys, and more about some programming decisions that have, in the opinion of this fan, been poorly thought out.
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Sheamus, I agree wholeheartedly. I’m a big Seesmic supporter and those particular features you talk about are the exact features I’m not happy with. I’ve mentioned these on the Seesmic forums as well as to @loic via Twitter. His response to me, re: the Twitter native retweet was that they plan on making the retweet/quote function customizable. Though if that were the plan, why not do it right up front.
I’m sticking with Seesmic Desktop, hoping that these issues will be addressed soon!
.-= Ken Mueller´s last blog ..Weekend Video: Mr. Splashy Pants Goes Viral =-.
Hi Ken. I’m sticking with it too, in the hope that they add these options in the next update. They’re usually very good at listening to the Seesmic community, and I’ve seen quite a few moans about these changes, so hopefully we’ll see some manner of compromise in version 0.8.
Shea, Thanks for your post. First of all, we’ve always appreciated you for being a Seesmic supporter, and very happy to hear your honest feedback, which of course our team is taking in. As you know, we try to do our best to listen and assess our users- and with the various products, we’ve kept ourselves quite busy. As Ken mentioned, we’re looking into making the retweet/quote customizable, and initially released in this manner as Twitter RT’s was a highly requested feature. I won’t go into specifics in the missing buttons, as we’re still taking in feedback, but the change was partially based on our positive feedback on the preview version of our Seesmic for Windows layout (which we’re also working on). Based on all the feedback, we’ll definitely see some compromise before a .8 version. As a small team with a half a dozen products to manage, we try to be as iterative as possible, and we’ll try to get something out pre-0.8 in a form that we’ll be happy with. Everyone is always open to email me at yama [at] seesmic [dot] com, as well.
Cheers John. I’m very much aware that a company has to make bold decisions and accept that X percentage of the userbase are always going to be upset about some changes, but I can’t for the life of me think why removing the buttons from the accounts pane would have been something that was welcome. In my experience, most folk aren’t even aware that functionality even existed – perhaps that was the reason why it was dropped? For me, however, especially on my Samsung NC10, it was super-useful.
In short, the reasons for removing the buttons in the account included a combination of the impact of adding the retweets timeline (crowding up the bottom buttons), the flexibility of using sub-items in the sidebar (as well as the flexibility of viewing the timelines next to each other – ex mentions and DM’s), the current confusion of the mixed-navigation between the sidebar and bottom buttons, and – looking ahead- the syncing of setting across apps. As mentioned before, if you look at our Seesmic for Windows and even our positive feedback for Seesmic Web, you’ll notice the pattern. Again we’re reviewing, assessing and appreciating all this feedback as well as your concern.
Have to say I’m very surprised that Twitter’s native RT was highly requested. The only thing I can see that people would want is the ability to SEE those retweets when someone RT’s via Twitter’s web interface. Previously you never knew when someone retweeted that way…but I don’t know anyone that actually liked twitter’s RT function.
Bring back the old Seesmic RT ( and the buttons) and I’ll be VERY happy with the new version.
.-= Ken Mueller´s last blog ..Weekend Video: Mr. Splashy Pants Goes Viral =-.
LOL I was writing in my mind the very same review, with the very same gripes, when I stumbled across this post while searching desperately for a link to the 0.6.3 beta 2 build.
Rather than reiterate the same points in my own review, I’ll simply be sharing the link to this one. It’s good to know I’m not alone in my abhorrence of the changes incorporated in Seesmic Desktop 0.7.
.-= Pariah Burke´s last blog ..All Apple Tablet Rumors in One Picture =-.
Much obliged.
Seamus, you pressed my button with “People Hate Change” and I feel a mini-rant coming on.
People indeed hate it .. when it wastes their time. PCs are non-intuitive enough to use without some developer changing the rules yet forgetting to simply test it on their Mum first!
Hostway’s SiteControl interface changed recently, and though I understand why, it now takes 3 or 4 more clicks to get simple domain management done. Yecch.
But no-one will ever top Windows Vista. With the entire world – especially those stubborn bloody-minded creatures comprising the ‘clients’ of our IT team workplace – finally used to using Win XP, what possessed Microsoft to change the icon, change the name, and change the location, of every common Windows task?
Sigh.
Uhh, ‘Sheamus’ – sorry
Happens a lot.
So peeved with the whole thing. Hated the RT change with a passion. Rolled back to the version you provided there (thanks btw, appreciate that) and found I had lost all my groups and set up. Argh. I hadn’t realised how it had grown but of course it has if you have followed a few hundred people since starting to use seesmic. What a monumental pain.
My apologies – I should have mentioned you lose your lists when you roll back. I’d stated this on Twitter but forgot to do so in the article (it happened to me as well). Will amend that now.
One thing that I’d love to see from Seesmic *very* soon – a way to back up Seesmic-generated lists. Long overdue.
A way to save and transfer settings would be very useful. I hadn’t quite realised how much I had done. The right twitter client really should let you put everything *just so* and let you be able to rebuild it easily should anything go wrong. (have given up on redoing everything since getting new hard drive in my laptop today hopefully. So will be stuck going back to the beginning anyway. Which just underlines the point of how annoying this is!)
Seamus,
Thanks for informative article and earlier version download for reinstall. I love Seesmic and I too installed the latest version. But geez, were you right! There are so many panes on the desktop, it’s a nightmare. Absolutely a very bad call on Seesmic’s part, which I am sure they will correct. Until then, happily using version 6
I’m right there with you. The single reason why I liked Seesmic Desktop over everything else were the buttons along the bottom. Being able to switch between tweets, replies, and DMs in the same window was huge. I honestly don’t know why that’s not the standard.
But now instead of SD being the only one with that feature, it’s just a Tweetdeck clone.
Thank you, Sheamus, for the download to the previous build. I’ll echo everything above. I didn’t mind the Twitter-native RT function. I find it useful that it lets me RT something to my followers without having to waste the “@username” characters. And to see that it was working properly in the new version of Seesmic gave me hope that 3rd-party Twitter clients were starting to incorporate it and that those Twitter-built RTs would soon start showing up across all different apps.
The fact that those buttons went away was the dealbreaker for me. Yes, you can access replies, mentions, DMs, and timeline via the sidebar in the new Seesmic. But if you manage multiple accounts, it gets messy FAST.
I handle 4 accounts for my job plus my own personal account. That means I can have as many as 20 columns open where 5 used to do. Trying to keep track of “AccountA/sent,” “AccountA/mentions,” “AccountA/replies” … and that’s if you happen to have them ordered logically.
If you’re not careful, you can have something really nasty, like, “AccountA/mentions,” “AccountC/replies,” “AccountB/sent,” “AccountA/retweets,” etc.
This is exactly why TweetDeck never appealed to me.
Anyway, thanks again for the download. I’ve loved Seesmic and support it. Just hope the next iteration keeps this in mind.
Thank you for this great link. I was so ticked off at the new update of Seesmic and have been looking all over the web for the rollback version!
Don’t know if this was part of the original roll-out or if it’s somehow been updated, but I do like the fact that you can still do an old-style RT (with the ability to add your own text, too). Unfortunately, it’s not very intuitive.
You have to click on the “More” button and then choose “Quote Message.” I updated a week or two ago and just now discovered that. Would be nice if it were more obvious.
.-= Dave´s last blog ..The True One-Hit Wonders of the 80s (Part 5) =-.
Yeah, I briefly mentioned this above. Still wasn’t enough for me. As I wrote, it’s one more click. And everybody hates that.
Good lord…how did I miss that?
sorry about that.
No worries at all. Believe me: it’s a good day when I don’t do the exact same thing. Twice.