[DaveSapien]

Thank you for confirming what I said.

I know I won't convince you one way or the other. I've seen statements eerily similar to yours before, that I feel that it might be a regurgitation from some article or book somewhere.

Note the use of dehumanising terms, literally calling customers animals and 'cannon fodder'.

This is what this (part of the) industry thinks of the people that play their games, cattle.

[somehnacct3757]

You have to call cohorts something. I know a gaming company that went very publicly out of their way to refer to the cohorts as Big Spenders, Hobbyists, etc. It didn't save their company. What you name your buckets doesn't matter.

SaaS companies call customers Users, talks about Activating and Retaining them, put them in Buckets. If this is your bar for dehumanizing then this must be a very frustrating website for you to visit.

Do you not shop at grocery stores? They put the milk and eggs in the back to psychologically manipulate you into walking past other items. And you're stored in their database as nothing but a phone number! So dehumanizing.

[DaveSapien]

No grocery store has my personal details...and yes I also have a big problem with grocery stores employing that tactic against children. Its psychological abuse and I will never, have never, taken a child in these places.

Horrible behaviour is not acceptable because other companies do it. What kind of argument is that?

Calling customers a User, is calling them a human being with a certain behaviour attached (using your app/service).

Naming your customers animals is a reflection of attitudes towards these customers. A hostile attitude I have tackled multiple times and every time I have called out, walked out, or changed the company. Its hard, not for everyone and I cant recommend it. I am just too aware of the tragic social impact of these tactics, and I have to try and not make the world a worse place.