I think we should stop calling these things "dark patterns" This is just plain old deception and scamming.
They have to justify that bloated stock price. YouTube is a huge competitor and FREE.
Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
111–120 of 126 posts
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
What did you think was going to happen after you entered your payment details for your "free trial"? Did you not read the terms at all ? It says clearly that it'll cost a monthly fee after the test period. Here's what you don't want to hear: You were acting negligent and irresponsible. You paid the price. Worst of all, you didn't seem to learn anything from it . You're here complaining that companies shouldn't take y…
It's not about the monthly fee, it's about the fee to cancel the subscription. Automatically transitioning someone from a free trial to a yearly membership with a penalty for early termination is insane. I mean, why stop at 1 year? Why not move free trial users to a 100 year contract with a $10,000 early termination fee? A certain percentage of users won't read the fine print--easy money!
It's not insane at all, it's how subscriptions commonly work. They run for the whole year, whether you want the whole year or not. If you can cancel at any time, that's a feature that is advertised. Adobe also offers this, for an increased monthly price.
When you enter a contract, you need to read the fine print. In this case, you didn't even read the bold print that said it'll cost you money. You have no one to blame but yourself.
> I mean, why stop at 1 year? Why not move free trial users to a 100 year contract with a $10,000 early termination fee?
Because a software subscription running over a period of 100 years would almost certainly be considered an "unfair term" and "unreasonable" under contract law.
Besides that, there are laws governing how products can be advertised, you can't display one price and then hide excessive extra fees in the fine print.
> A certain percentage of users won't read the fine print--easy money!
A certain percentage of users don't read anything at all. There's lots of sleazy companies out there, looking for fools to part from their money. It's usually perfectly legal, because the same laws that make contracts possible make exploitation possible. You can't have one without the other.
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#113Isn't this the whole point of yearly subscriptions? Seems like you should be shaking your fist at the sky instead of at Pluralsight.
1) capture additional revenue from those canceling (even better: not using) prior to 1 year
2) capture additional revenue from those forgetting to cancel
Distant 3) getting the cash up front. If your business really needs working capital that bad, I don't think you'll be in business very long.
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
Registrars will generally auto-renew domains for their registrants regardless of any TLD-specific policies. And that makes sense; letting a domain name lapse absent explicit instruction is generally the wrong thing to do.
Well depending on the tld, there are grace periods after it lapses
And depending on TLD, it can be quite expensive to restore a domain during the redemption grace period. Much better to not let it get into that situation in the first place.
Plus there are autorenew grace periods, so the saner thing is to keep the domain around and then delete it if the registrant objects (and then they get their money back).
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#115> For anyone considering subscribing to Pluralsight, be aware that they will not inform you of their auto-renewal policy, and will charge you once your subscription is up for annual renewal without warning. In my case, this auto-renewal has cost me $300.
I'm glad you mention this. The same thing happened to me and is one of the big reasons I cancelled and won't be using them ever again.
I can't remember the details but it seemed sketchy at the time, I signed up for a free trial and they ended up just sending me a bill for $300 after the 7 days expired, without any text or warnings that this would happen before hand (not during the free trial sign up either).
Yes, a very dark-pattern indeed.
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#116Isn't this the whole point of yearly subscriptions? Seems like you should be shaking your fist at the sky instead of at Pluralsight. 1) capture additional revenue from those canceling (even better: not using) prior to 1 year 2) capture additional revenue from those forgetting to cancel Distant 3) getting the cash up front. If your business really needs working capital that bad, I don't think you'll be in business ver…
> 2) capture additional revenue from those forgetting to cancel
This is the dark pattern exactly and nothing to do with annual subscriptions as a business process. I'm not sure why people are willing to put up with it. If I have an annual renewal, I should be reminded. Actively encouraging and/or relying on your users to forget the renewal date is scummy, simple-as.
As another poster mentioned, this is such a problem that Visa have encoded this in the user terms. In the EU, you have to remind your users 7 days in advance of the renewal date if the subscription has been greater than 6 months.
Saying that this is "just the way it is" completely ignores the actual issue.
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#117I can't think of a single subscription service that does not auto-renew. Can you? Companies consider that a "feature" because it provides uninterrupted service. Is your beef with them because they didn't email you to let you know they were going to bill you for renewal? Do what I do. Never trust a company. Whenever you sign up for a recurring service or a free trial, add an event to your personal calendar that remind…
Beeminder will apparently automatically stop charging you if you stop logging in to their service.
It's true! http://blog.beeminder.com/autocancel
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#118Try buying ads on linkedin and setting an amount you want to spend. It auto-renewed that amount, every day for weeks, without an email or even linkedin profile notification. It's an extremely shady dark pattern. I lost well over $1000 to them before I discovered it and cancelled. Have fun getting a refund as well. In short, avoid.
To be fair, LI uses dark patterns with the same gusto that a wolf has for a lamb ranch. I thought they were widely known for their scummy tactics.
https://medium.com/@danrschlosser/linkedin-dark-patterns-3ae...
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#119Isn't this the whole point of yearly subscriptions? Seems like you should be shaking your fist at the sky instead of at Pluralsight. 1) capture additional revenue from those canceling (even better: not using) prior to 1 year 2) capture additional revenue from those forgetting to cancel Distant 3) getting the cash up front. If your business really needs working capital that bad, I don't think you'll be in business ver…
> 2) capture additional revenue from those forgetting to cancel This is the dark pattern exactly and nothing to do with annual subscriptions as a business process. I'm not sure why people are willing to put up with it. If I have an annual renewal, I should be reminded. Actively encouraging and/or relying on your users to forget the renewal date is scummy, simple-as. As another poster mentioned, this is such a problem…
I don't mean it in a "just the way it is" sense. but rather that there are a TON of companies that do this. get mad at all of them.
as for the OP, hope he used a credit card (not debit) and if so, dispute the charge.
Re: Tell HN: Pluralsight and the dark-pattern of auto-renewals
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm a member of a club in the UK which raises money for charity - we've stopped giving money to corporate charities because their overheads are such a high percentage of their takings - at this point they're largely just self-perpetuating bureaucracy machines. We give cash to small volunteer-run charities where we know that 100% of the money raised goes to the cause in question.
What do you consider a high percentage? Looking at Oxfam, it's 10% admin and 7% fundraising [1], which doesn't seem too bad given their global reach. Admittedly their reputation has taken a bit of a tumble due to the scandals. [1] https://www.oxfam.org.uk/donate/how-we-spend-your-money
Personally I would like a general rule of no more than 10% split between admin and fundraising, with 5% being considered the normal. 10% makes a nice Schilling fence.
Ideally I won't allow any budget for advertising, because that will just move money from one charity to another.
Alternatively I would only donate to the top of Give Well.