I spent 25 years in mainstream IT before going it alone 8 years ago. I've always been in 'support' not 'development'. It's been my job (from lowly analyst to IT director) to see the IT service from the users' point of view.

Apart from not giving them the additional functionality they ask for (whether they need it or not!), the worse thing the IT department can do to the users is to change the way their systems look and work.

Developers (almost) never see or understand this - generally, they don't have to pick up the pieces or placate the angry hordes (unless they have to fix a new bug they've introduced).

If something breaks, it's generally relatively easy to sort out, even it it involves a full or partial roll-back, and doesn't lose a user/business much time.

If the way a system looks and works changes, there are huge implications because of the frustration it causes, and the retraining required (not to mention changed documentation).

As the IT director of a 600-seat organisation, I had to choose if upgrading all the desktops from Win-XP was a good idea. The business management thought we should have the latest (and safest) version. When I presented the hardware and software upgrade costs, plus the retraining and documentation costs ... they were entirely happy to stay with XP. The cost of the licenses was nothing.

Now I build WordPress sites (far less stress than corporate IT). There are about 30 we host, of which half a dozen are family sites (who want everything for free). I've been able to persuade less than 20% of my clients to pay for a maintenance service. Most of the others are small one-man businesses or hobby businesses, and they tell me they can't afford the £220 per year.

£220 buys them two premium plugins (backup and security), offsite cloud storage for the backups, plus time to upgrade sites three times a year (always after the first WP maintenance release to avoid the bugs). I check the Change Log and latest Reviews, hoping to spot problems before I update each plugin. I use UpdraftPlus so I can roll-back if something causes a major problem (done this once so far this year, removing WP4.4.1). There are often small tweaks needed when the theme or plugins have changed. Paid-for plugins can be just as troublesome as free ones.

This all takes time, and what's left of the £220 doesn't go far when spread over three updates a year. It also has to cover phone support ... "where's the 'x' thing gone?". And I have to keep track of what I'm doing, issue monthly invoices (most don't want to pay the whole amount upfront), and what might be coming in the next core/theme/plugin updates.

I'm not fazed by the visual and functionality changes, but do get cross if something I've been using is taken away (padding for images?). I can fix problems, so long as they don't require coding. I'm tech-savvy.

My clients don't edit their sites every day. It wouldn't occur to them to read blogs about WordPress - it's just a tool to them. It isn't their business.

I suggest all developers should be familiar with 'change fatigue'. It's normally associated with organisational change, but I've seen it caused by IT changes too. It's demotivating.

So, Matt old buddy, don't increase the frequency of changes. Don't change things for the sake of it, and for god's sake don't just rely on developers' feedback.