[somebody78978]

Regarding TurboTax, I'm pretty sure the clients want the software to work slower; there are times when the software just pauses and says something like "Checking over to make sure we found all deductions", even though obviously all of that work has already been done.

[xyzelement]

I was actually thinking about that case - does the slowness "suggest" that the software is really thinking deeply and working hard for me. I do think you have a good point.

[adamckay]

It does indeed. Here's an article that discusses it more [1]. I know of a few thins that introduce an artificial wait with a progress bar to make the user feel like it's doing something complex.

There's also situations in the real world too, coin counting machines apparently also delay showing the results because people won't believe that dumping a jar full of coins into a machine and having an instant answer can be accurate.

People also do it too, locksmiths may umm and ah when called out to pick a lock because if they do it too quickly customers can feel aggrieved at a large invoice or even feel less safe in their homes if they've seen their front door picked in 10 seconds.

1 - https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/02/why-s...

[TeMPOraL]

The third example (locksmiths) I get, they're making a little show to avoid a difficult conversation with some customers[0]. A bit scummy, but then again, plenty of customers are no saints themselves. However, the first two examples feel like self-fulfilling prophesies to me.

Normal people have no reference point to judge how fast or slow software and hardware should be, other than through direct experience. By adding fake delays to avoid being honest and perhaps reassuring occasional surprised users, vendors just screw with the mental frameworks people build, at scale. It's a wasted opportunity, too, because if you're brave enough to be honest about execution time and weather the initial wave of distrust, then you may become a new reference point for your users, who will now view your competitors' software as bloated.

--

[0] - Though recently I brought this story up with a locksmith, and he said he thinks it's just stupid and there are hardly any situations in which it would even make sense.

[bombcar]

I think the locksmith thing comes from a couple of things:

1. Some disreputable locksmiths (word gets around) - probably very few

2. A locksmith will try the fast methods first, if they work he wins, if they don’t he didn’t waste too much time.

3. After doing a lock once he could immediately redo the same lock much faster and this may make it look like he could have done it very fast to begin