How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
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Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#2Here's ThredUP's Julia Boyle posting a number of open engineering positions in a recent "Who is hiring?" thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18358221
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#3Not all these notifications are fake but they can still be misleading.
I've investigated a few of these sorts of apps on Shopify. They do use actual customer names but how long ago those orders came in seems a little dubious.
I believe it's not so much to promote fear of missing out - other apps do that better - e.g. ones that copy booking.com's pattern of 'only x left!'.
Instead, they're a very good way to signal to potential buyers that the (usually small) shop is being used by other shoppers to increase trust.
Few people go in to empty restaurants.
It would be interesting to know if there are legal implications to lying about your visitors using services like these, though.
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#4"The report coincides with discussions among lawmakers about regulating technology companies, including through a bill proposed in April by Senators Deb Fischer, Republican of Nebraska, and Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, that is meant to limit the use of dark patterns by making some of the techniques illegal and giving the Federal Trade Commission more authority to police the practice.
"We are focused in on a problem that I think everyone recognizes," said Ms. Fischer, adding that she became interested in the problem after becoming annoyed in her personal experience with the techniques."
If we used programmer vernacular we might say she was "scratching her own itch".
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#5"The report coincides with discussions among lawmakers about regulating technology companies, including through a bill proposed in April by Senators Deb Fischer, Republican of Nebraska, and Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, that is meant to limit the use of dark patterns by making some of the techniques illegal and giving the Federal Trade Commission more authority to police the practice. "We are focused in on a pro…
Too bad lawmakers must first experience the problem themselves, before they spring to action. I believe support for healthcare problems and modern-day solutions (such as s embryonic stem cell research) would benefit from showing more passion towards others.
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#6An age old tactic I have encountered: Deep discounts (after raising the prices of course). For e.g.
(Harvard research paper - WIP) https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/18-113_16977...
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/how-ret...
https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2018/09/24/what...
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#7Here's ThredUP's Julia Boyle posting a number of open engineering positions in a recent "Who is hiring?" thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18358221
The link is 7 months old. I am geniunely curious how this is relevant to the discussion. Can you clarify please?
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#8An age old tactic I have encountered: Deep discounts (after raising the prices of course). For e.g. (Harvard research paper - WIP) https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/18-113_16977... https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/how-ret... https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2018/09/24/what...
Udemy business model, fake 90% discounts
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#9"The report coincides with discussions among lawmakers about regulating technology companies, including through a bill proposed in April by Senators Deb Fischer, Republican of Nebraska, and Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, that is meant to limit the use of dark patterns by making some of the techniques illegal and giving the Federal Trade Commission more authority to police the practice. "We are focused in on a pro…
Trying to ban things as they pop up is a long and arduous process. On the other hand, making more sweeping laws may have a lot of unwanted or unforseen side-effects.
Re: How e-commerce sites manipulate people into buying things
#10NYTimes + incognito = rejection.