So I’ve had some pretty poor experiences with all shielded wallets recently:
Molasses-slow syncing, errors when they do sync, inexplicable sending issues, URIs and amount key/values not parsed, compatibility with network upgrades only after they occur…
I’ve got numerous friends for whom their only interaction with Zcash are these wallets, and frankly, it can be an embarrassing experience when they actually try to use them.
An example: dropping a couple dollars in a jar for coffee at PorcFest was far more stress-free than waiting endlessly for my wallet just to sync. That vendor had posted a Zcash QR code, but I gave up. What does a 75-second blocktime mean for real world payments if you first need minutes just to boot up? And if I resorted to fiat, how unlikely is the next person to use Zcash?
And today, a friend tried to access his wallet, but was confronted instantly with a user-unfriendly, unrecoverable error. I told him to import the seed into another wallet, and that one crashed twice and wouldn’t sync. (This latter wallet won’t even sync for me beyond 86% today.)
Zcash must deliver a world-class experience, or we’ll have new users giving up before they begin and requesting Venmo instead. This experience for 99% of intended users is at the mobile wallet level.
That Zcash needs a million-dollar marketing campaign now while the UX lacks a solid foundation is frankly upsidedown. What happens when the curious try using it for the first time?
What is this community doing to prioritise and deliver a real-world usable wallet experience? If there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, I’m praying the tunnel is nonetheless short.
(This is not to discourage or disparage those building whose efforts are greatly appreciated. My frustration though is real, as I really can’t onboard users suspecting I’ll be embarrassed the next time we send each other funds. Does anyone else feel this?)
But while perhaps realistic for the time being, the advice is reminsicent of a Bitcoin Maxi suggesting to just use credit cards because of high BTC transaction fees. 
It’s a critical problem worth solving, because we want Zcash to be 10x+ better than cash; and as it affects not just tipping, but every good or service or application using ZEC.
