It turns out, User term origin can be traced back to mainframe compute, which were massive, requiring dedicated space and could be operated only by trained personnel, who were called Users then. User made sense back then as they were vital cogs required for their efficient operations

Today, all tech is designed to be used by anyone, so maybe it’s time to ditch it as with software and algorithm have replaced the human cogs.

Jack Dorsey did replace with customer for Square, and even Meta in 2014 replaced it with people. Yet, it doesn’t appear “User” will be ditched anytime soon.

Ironically, tech firms, fearing their customers would feel disconnected, cleverly ditched “chatbot” across their AI system, replacing it with Co-Pilot or assistant or collaborator or agent. 

I do hope that, in the same vein, we humans also get an upgrade from “user”