Michael Feathers shared what he called his abstract defense of Postel’s law:
Open acceptance allows learning. Narrowness & restriction are valuable for protection, but they have opportunity costs that are largely hidden. It pays to investigate them to make informed design choices in every system – social & technical.
I think Michael’s defense can be applied fairly directly to communication between humans: “Open communication allows learning. Narrowing and restricting what’s acceptable is valuable for protection, but there are hidden opportunity costs. It pays to make informed design choices in how and what you communicate.”
Making informed design choices is what I’m after in my study of psychology, communication skills and techniques. This working with humans stuff is hard!
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