Phrases like “PEBCAK” and “a better idiot” are colorful and thus can appear dismissive and insulting without context, but they do have useful and charitable interpretations too. But that investigation might sometimes conclude the UX design is acceptable! It IS a signal to investigate the UX in question and see if it can be improved, you shouldn’t discard the signal entirely. This affects how you react to an instance of confusion: it is not a signal that the UX in question necessarily needs to be changed, as it may be working well for every other user and a change will introduce more confusion. In my view, the message is that UX is a bit like an arms race, or a Red Queen race, or some other kind of race - that is, you should always be improving your UX, and simultaneously you’ll never have the perfect UX that everyone can use for everything they want to do without any confusion. I don’t think that quote means that users are idiots for not being able to use your UX, nor do I think is it saying that you shouldn’t devote effort to making your UX clearer and easier to use. I was recalling a quote by Rick Cook, “Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. There isn’t as much malice in my calling the user an idiot as it might seem.
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