The Beta Channel
When the Beta Features system originally was released, many developers Enrolled in the “Beta Channel”.
This beta channel now seems to be causing lots of problems with developers who have enabled this setting a long time ago, or those who are unsure as to what it does.
I have seen tons of developers outraged when certain betas are enabled, claiming they’re forcing them onto users, or claiming they should be “opt-in” instead of “opt-out”, but don’t realize that the reason they’re experiencing this behavior is due to their enabling of this setting.
Specifically looking at the replies of announcements like this, lots of the comments are outraged users who don’t realize they can toggle this beta off.
Why this matters
When betas that negatively impact developers are enabled, people get angry and comments start becoming unproductive rather than ways to improve a feature. The point of a beta program is to gather feedback, not “disable this, its broken” or “bad update”, like many responses become.
Ideas on how to resolve
- Notify developers in the “Beta Track” when new betas are enabled. Give them a notification, “Hey, this new beta was enabled, and a reminder that you can disable it in Settings”.
- Discontinue the Beta Track all together, and allow people to opt into the features that best fit their needs.
