Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 193 posts

Re: Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

#11

Post by noxToken »

AVG had (possibly still does) a dark pattern with their free AV software, and I fell for it once.

I was in the middle of a game when the stupid ad for Web TuneUp[0] appeared from my task bar over the screen. The linked image is exactly how it appeared with the auto-confirm box pre-checked. In a rush to dismiss the ad to get back to my match, I accidentally clicked the OK button instead of the tiny decline.

Of course, uninstalling that travesty was a nightmare.

[0]: http://www.ghacks.net/2016/01/01/avg-putting-millions-of-chr...

Re: Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

#12

Post by someone7x »

The thing about dark patterns is that feels like an abuse of the commons. Because of scummy practices like this I am absolutely less willing to explore a site that requests my email, or buy something from a random site (I just see if it's on amazon and buy it there).

For example, a few days ago there was a Show HN about PlateJoy, which sounded really interesting. But, the only way I could learn about it was to enter my email and take a quiz. Now enters the part where the antics of countless other bad actors takes its toll on an otherwise innocent website; I decide it isn't worth the risk and move a long.

Re: Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

#15

Post by JusticeJuice »

sp332 wrote: post #2

Not just the web either. This morning Cortana turned green and said "Oh hey!" in my taskbar. I clicked it and it gave me the regular interface - there was no alert or anything, they just wanted to boost their Cortana interaction numbers for the day. That's wasting my time and making it less likely that I will pay attention if there is an actual alert later.

They tried that with clippy to make people like it more. It was hated.

Re: Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

#17

Post by grenoire »

joeblau wrote: post #13

I'm wondering if there would be any value in an Anti-Dark Pattern plugin? Basically a browser plugin that un-does all of the dark patterns companies use to try and trick people and give you a straight result.

The amount of work put into it may not necessarily be worth it the gains, given how many different websites there are with varying implementations of these patterns.

Re: Dark Patterns are designed to confuse and enroll

#20

Post by dublinben »

SNvD7vEJ wrote: post #18

Adobe flash update notification always have the McAfee Antivirus trial installer pre-selected by default. Pisses me off every time.

Uninstall Adobe Flash. You're better off without it anyway. If for any reason you still might need it, it's included in Chrome.
Post reply on HN