Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox • Hacker News Board

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#41

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 4:53 AM UTC

CuriousCosmic wrote: post #9

bitt wrote: post #6

Websites should not ask users for permission notifications. It only annoys the people using it. It is a bad idea! If users are interested enough in your content, they will find a way to opt-in for notifications like email; an opt-in for notifications button or even RSS. Why would website owners assume that users want to get notifications only after 5 seconds of visiting a random site?

Some of them do have legitimate uses, like chat apps (messages.android.com for example). Otherwise though I do agree that they are a fairly bad idea.

[deleted]

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#42

Post by a_t48 » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 4:55 AM UTC

barryvan wrote: post #30

zaroth wrote: post #21

Downgrading the prompt to a non-popup icon in the address bar unless it follows a user action sounds like the perfect balance. This won’t entirely stop sites which are properly trying to request the permission in the worst case, and the navbar icon is unobtrusive enough that if it gets spammed it’s no big deal. Actually I think it makes sense to persistently show the notification icon in the navbar once the permissio…

> Downgrading the prompt to a non-popup icon in the address bar unless it follows a user action sounds like the perfect balance. Agreed. If it's in direct response to a user action (a sync response to a click or a tap on an element smaller than 300x300px, for example), I think it's perhaps more legitimate to have a more visible indication, like a strip across the top. (I'd want the element size constrained to avoid i…

A nice tiling of invisible squares across the page can get around your element size restriction.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#43

Post by ptaipale » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 4:56 AM UTC

43920 wrote: post #39

bitt wrote: post #6

Websites should not ask users for permission notifications. It only annoys the people using it. It is a bad idea! If users are interested enough in your content, they will find a way to opt-in for notifications like email; an opt-in for notifications button or even RSS. Why would website owners assume that users want to get notifications only after 5 seconds of visiting a random site?

I almost wonder if sites are hoping people will enable notifications by accident, and then read the content after getting notified. I know at least a few people who've clicked the "allow" button by mistake, and then couldn't figure out how to turn the notifications off.

That's certainly the logic, no doubt about it.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#44

Post by Dylan16807 » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 4:56 AM UTC

iKevinShah wrote: post #16

caltelt wrote: post #13

I feel like Solution 1 is pretty close to what I see as the "solution". I think for commonly requested permissions that are not commonly accepted, they should just use a smaller, more discreet icon for notifying the user; one that doesn't hang down over the chrome and block/cover up the site. That way, it can be easily ignored. It should be more obvious than the one they're using in that solution. Maybe something equ…

As someone with "not-so-tech-savvy" users on my website, this is bound to get ignored a lot. I have seen screenshots of my users (when they need support) and they dont even click "Okay" on the Cookie bar (to accept cookies and stuff) and / or any notification on the website (Not the Push Notification).

Is there a reason you have a cookie bar? The idea of a 'click ok' bar should be dead since GDPR adjusted the law. If it's not for tracking then you don't need a bar. If it is for tracking then whenever possible the site should work without opting in.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#45

Post by josephg » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:00 AM UTC

amanzi wrote: post #37

Good work from Mozilla, but it won't help prevent those sites that pop up a HTML modal asking you to subscribe by email AND then a few seconds later pop up another HTML modal asking to send you notifications to keep you up to date AND then sliding in something from the bottom with "relevant" posts AND maybe also slide something else in from the top or sides with some other thing that just ends up blocking the content…

I opened a medium post the other day from my phone that did all this stuff. It was amazing - there was a bar up the top asking me to install the medium app. Then another bar below that asking me to subscribe to the author or something. Then a call-to-action pop-over on the bottom of the screen asking me to join a mailing list or something.

Only about 1/4 of my phone screen was left displaying the content - which wasn't even enough space to see the post's title on my plus sized phone.

I closed the tab, because who has time for that?

I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal. (Maybe medium figures an X% drop in blog engagement is worth it if a few readers join their mailing list).

In the meantime I'd like it if all browsers added an option to automatically block all website notification requests. Firefox does this, and its great.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#46

Post by lugg » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:01 AM UTC

a_t48 wrote: post #42

barryvan wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Downgrading the prompt to a non-popup icon in the address bar unless it follows a user action sounds like the perfect balance. Agreed. If it's in direct response to a user action (a sync response to a click or a tap on an element smaller than 300x300px, for example), I think it's perhaps more legitimate to have a more visible indication, like a strip across the top. (I'd want the element size constrained to avoid i…

A nice tiling of invisible squares across the page can get around your element size restriction.

Do we even need the restriction.

We're talking about spammyness of a UI element because access requests are misaligned with user desire.

All you're saying is the site will pop up a request for access whenever I do anything, ok, how is that different to what we have no?

It's not going to be the norm, it's just going to be a few bad actors.

Doesn't mean we put up with spam everywhere else.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#47

Post by lugg » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:12 AM UTC

43920 wrote: post #36

adrianmonk wrote: post #22

I'm still shocked that anybody thought the first generation implementation of this (in any browser, not specific to Firefox) was ever a good idea. I can see making the request visible to the end user, but... as a dialog ? Why? At least make it a narrow bar across the top/bottom that doesn't obscure web site content and can be easily ignored. Perhaps better would be to make it a button like there is a button to favori…

As long as the websites that request the permission have a legitimate reason to show notifications, a dialog is actually a good idea - it makes it easy for users to enable notifications, whereas a toolbar button would be easy to miss. If browsers had anticipated every random news site asking to show notifications, I imagine it would have been designed differently.

No, it's not.

Currently on legitimate and decently built sites I get a custom JS modal popup that asks me to accept the location request before they even request location access. They do this because otherwise their location request gets dismissed by users out of habbit and then people don't know how to reenable it.

It's shit UX.

Notifications and always on location access should be a bell icon in the url bar. Think YouTube notifications.

On top of that, there should be a "use location" html element that sets it's value to the current location when clicked. It would also be nice if that threw up a warning when proxy settings are detected.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#48

Post by lugg » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:15 AM UTC

josephg wrote: post #45

amanzi wrote: post #37

Good work from Mozilla, but it won't help prevent those sites that pop up a HTML modal asking you to subscribe by email AND then a few seconds later pop up another HTML modal asking to send you notifications to keep you up to date AND then sliding in something from the bottom with "relevant" posts AND maybe also slide something else in from the top or sides with some other thing that just ends up blocking the content…

I opened a medium post the other day from my phone that did all this stuff. It was amazing - there was a bar up the top asking me to install the medium app. Then another bar below that asking me to subscribe to the author or something. Then a call-to-action pop-over on the bottom of the screen asking me to join a mailing list or something. Only about 1/4 of my phone screen was left displaying the content - which wasn…

Fyi, you might like, Firefox + ublock + annoyances list on mobile fix most of this garbage.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#49

Post by luckylion » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:21 AM UTC

43920 wrote: post #36

adrianmonk wrote: post #22

I'm still shocked that anybody thought the first generation implementation of this (in any browser, not specific to Firefox) was ever a good idea. I can see making the request visible to the end user, but... as a dialog ? Why? At least make it a narrow bar across the top/bottom that doesn't obscure web site content and can be easily ignored. Perhaps better would be to make it a button like there is a button to favori…

As long as the websites that request the permission have a legitimate reason to show notifications, a dialog is actually a good idea - it makes it easy for users to enable notifications, whereas a toolbar button would be easy to miss. If browsers had anticipated every random news site asking to show notifications, I imagine it would have been designed differently.

Didn't they? It sounds strange to assume that nobody ever wondered how this feature might be abused - it's not like that hasn't happened before in the history of browsers.

Re: Reducing notification permission prompt spam in Firefox

#50

Post by luckylion » Tue, Apr 02, 2019, 5:26 AM UTC

josephg wrote: post #45

amanzi wrote: post #37

Good work from Mozilla, but it won't help prevent those sites that pop up a HTML modal asking you to subscribe by email AND then a few seconds later pop up another HTML modal asking to send you notifications to keep you up to date AND then sliding in something from the bottom with "relevant" posts AND maybe also slide something else in from the top or sides with some other thing that just ends up blocking the content…

I opened a medium post the other day from my phone that did all this stuff. It was amazing - there was a bar up the top asking me to install the medium app. Then another bar below that asking me to subscribe to the author or something. Then a call-to-action pop-over on the bottom of the screen asking me to join a mailing list or something. Only about 1/4 of my phone screen was left displaying the content - which wasn…

> I can never tell if websites don't know how many people get turned away by how awful their websites are, or if they know but figure its a good deal.

Having been told to implement aggressive exit-intent overlays on sites: I'm pretty sure it's the latter. A substantial amount of people don't bounce if you throw an annoying "do you really not want to know this secret?" overlay at them with an option saying something like "OK YES I WANT TO KNOW". I hate sites that do it, but for most sites, it's not tech-adept power users that make up the audience.