Today’s applications provide closed systems that can not be modified or extended to suit the needs of a user. Settings, plugins, modding, and even open-source don’t address these limitations because they create sharp cliffs between a worker’s power and and a worker’s skill required for tailoring.
The solution is malleable software—a philosophy of software as resuasable, user-configurable tools that offer a “gentle slope” to tailoring them to the user’s specific needs. Malleable software leads to powerful systems that can be adapted to the environment of the user with varying degrees of skill.
Read Malleable software - Restoring user agency in a world of locked-down apps from Ink & Switch.
See also:
- One of my favorite examples is that Emacs is the ultimate editor building material
- While this is akin to one of one software, I like that the authors insist that community and collaboration are important to malleable software
- As a counterpoint, applications are almost perfect for commercialization and that makes popularization of malleable software more of a cultural innovation than a technological one