It's All in the Eyes of the Beholder...

Consumerist has a couple of threads about the horrors of Japanese snack foods.

The (hello, Web 2.0) comments often seem to be along the lines of, "I never had that, I never will, it is so gross, the Japanese are so weird."

I have traveled in Asia a lot. Not as much as someone stationed over there, but more than your average non-military 30-something.

I have come back from my various trips absolutely addicted to Pretz. Pretz are an off-shoot of Pocky. Pocky are quite yummy on their own-- little cracker chocolate sticks. Pretz are the non-sweet version.

I've had every flavor of Pretz I could get my hands on; heck, I've even updated Wikipedia's entry.

Pringles must employ some people like me. They've recently come out with what I can only call the Pringles version of Pizza Pretz (my favorite Pretz).

I like them. In fact, I love them. 90 calories a packet, too, so not as horrible for the hip. My only beef is that only one of our grocery stores has them and I can't figure out which one, or where they shelve them.

Now, if Pringles was run by the folks commenting on Consumerist, this product would not exist. "Pizza flavored wheat toothpick cracker things? Ewwww."

What does a Pizza Pringle Wheat Stick Thing have to do with web design, usability, computers, or, as the title says, spell checking?

Who are you listening to when you design? Are you listening to the loudest negative voices? Or are you looking at the numbers below the voices?

I'm sure Pringles knew exactly where in the market place Pretz fall in Asia, as well as how many dollars are spent annually importing them to America. Those numbers won out over the loud voices of "ick. Asian food."

Are one or two people raining on your parade, or are you exploring options anyway?