Mechanical Keyboard Sound Isn't That Simple
Figure 1: I couldn't think of a more literal way to represent this article if I tried... Looking back just a few years ago, there’s no doubt that the huge influx of people that joined the hobby at the peak of the COVID pandemic were drawn to keyboards by way of YouTube, TikTok, and other audio-visual content platforms. Even as the output from these content creators has waned in recent months, their collective impact and legacy on the keyboard hobby is rather firmly etched in the history books. As a result of all of their sound tests, build logs, and opinion videos, the message is clear to any new person joining the hobby: mechanical keyboards are all about the sound. Thock this, clack that. Whether it’s keyboards, keycaps, or even singular switches, seemingly everyone new to the hobby meticulously pores over each component of their keyboard not in an attempt to figure out how it will feel in hand, but how it will sound as they’re furiously grinding their way out from...
Mar 27, 2024
It saddens me to find that you are disappointed by your experience so far.
Could you elaborate on why though?
So far the shipping schedule is way ahead of schedule, and we've been providing updates along the way as promised. Is there anything we could do more to make it better for you?
We'll do our best to post more updates more often whenever we can.
Just to get it out there up front -- this is meant in a constructive manner, but I'm not so good at articulating things clearly sometimes. My apologies in advance if it comes across wrong. This isn't particularly focused on this thread; I've observed this happening on a lot of drops, and I'm hoping I can provide some useful data.
In many of these types of comment threads, it feels like we've all been talking past each other. I don't think anybody is particularly irritated, but here's what I see going on: The impression given by promising an update "on <date> or sooner" is that the update MIGHT come early. The dissonance comes, in my limited experience, from the fact that drop updates that are early are an expectation, but when they're met at the last minute, it somehow feels like a violation of that expectation.
Human psychology being what it is, even when updates come early, if there's one that somehow feels like it's late (even though it's technically not), that one psuedo-late update taints the whole thing.
Let's take the update post on this very drop as an example. An update was promised "on 1/15 or sooner." The expectation is that the update might get here early, 1/15 at the latest. The update was provided on 1/15 -- at 11:48 PM. I'm in the same time zone. I was actually up when it came in.
12 minutes left in the day. Yes, that meets the letter of what was promised, but even though you're doing exactly what you promised, it doesn't *feel* like it.
The only solution I've been able to come up with is to instead say, "Expect an update at the end of the day (PST) on 1/15." That way, if you're early, we're all delighted, but if it comes in at 11:48 PM, we're not disappointed.
Does that make sense / help?
We certainly are not trying to use technicality of time zone difference to be correct. Our intention is to do our best to provide as many updates as we can so everyone participating in the drop can follow the progress along the way. Admittedly, we are not quite there yet. We've already have a few plans in the pipeline that we think will substantially improve the experience throughout on Massdrop. Stay tuned :)