Jason Fried is founder and president of 37signals, a Web interface design and usability consultancy, whose philosophy can be summed up in this quote:
The thing is that we’re really big into realizing that there are people on the other end. We’re all using computers to do things, but there are still people on the other end. It’s really inhumane to treat people with such disrespect when something goes wrong that they get a cryptic error message that sounds like a computer is talking to them.
37signals has designed websites/products/tools such as: Basecamp, Ta-Da List, and Backpack. Read more in the interview here.