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Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

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Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#241

Post by reificator »

bmuon wrote: post #227
bogwog wrote: post #152

A common one is fake consent popups for system notifications. Websites need to ask for consent before sending system notifications via the Notifications API. If a user declines, that website is blocked from asking again (for obvious reasons) But many websites cheat this by showing a fake consent popup designed to mimic what the browser would show. If a user clicks "Decline" on the fake popup, the website won't show t…

Is this really a dark pattern? There's tons of truly deceptive practices but this is one where websites are plainly asking for permissions.

The browser is designed so that a website gets one chance to ask for that permission, rather than nag every single time you visit.

If it's not a dark pattern to ask again every time you hit Deny, then why don't they do it again every time you hit Allow?

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#242

Post by catillac »

armchairhacker wrote: post #228
Mixtape wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit is just as guilty of this. If you want to see all the comments on a thread on their mobile site, you're pushed to install their official app and presumably create an account when doing so. As far as I can tell, the best workaround is to use the desktop site.

For iOS, I recommend Apollo ( https://apolloapp.io/ ). A reddit client that isn't from Reddit.

Thank you! I almost universally use the mobile website but it just keeps getting worse, presumably on purpose. I installed the official app but it’s very bad. I’ll download this one now!

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#243

Post by wincy »

kingsuper20 wrote: post #150
diveanon wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you bemoan what the internet has become and support Amazon in the comment?

Because they are one of the few internet companies that I find actually useful. If you live in a rural area, there's really no other way. A new PC, a floor jack, large book store, decent boots, are all 60 miles away. Of course, Amazon caused part of the retail desert, although I'd mostly blame box stores (and the Sears catalog before that). With the sites I named, I think my life would trundle on pretty much unchange…

Before the Sears catalog you instead had local monopolies by general store owners who could be absolute tyrants since there weren’t any cars. Getting what you need has always been difficult unless you literally live where it’s being made, which these days is Shenzhen or Guangzhou or somewhere like that.

The Rise and Fall of American Growth [0] is a fascinating book that talks about how much the Sears catalog revolutionized commerce in rural America.

[0] https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Fall-American-Growth-Princeton/d...

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#244

Post by harles »

shiftpgdn wrote: post #44
dmix wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

About 10yrs ago NBA did this to me. They made it impossible to cancel a $99/m sub. Their instructions were login and go to the cancel button but the cancel button was broken and said call this number. But no one ever picked up the number. I will never buy a NBA branded thing after that obvious bullshit scam.

New York Times does this also. As far as I can tell it's literally impossible to cancel a subscription. I had to close the card attached to my account.

I ran into this as well with NYT (grabbed a sub for election season only). You can cancel if you chat with someone during business hours - and immediately shoot down any attempt to to extend etc.

Related, I really hate Apple taking a permanent 30% cut of iOS subs, but I will use that route whenever possible. Canceling an iOS sub is always a painless single click experience from a known location. In fact I usually subscribe and immediately cancel so I’ll renew only if I actively choose to do so.

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#245

Post by ascotan »

fpig wrote: post #17

The worst one is probably trying to make it hard for users to stop paying for a service, like cancelling a subscription. That shit should be punishable by literal prison time.

Good example of this is where you can only unsubscribe via phone so they can route you to a 'specialist' that attempts to talk you out of it. i.e. you can subscribe via software but but unsubscribe via phone.

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#246

Post by la_fayette »

enedil wrote: post #226
Stratoscope wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get these all the time on mobile websites, and arrived at the same solution you did: tap Accept on the fake popup and then Block on the real consent box. I suppose a site could trick me by making their fake popup look exactly like the real one. But in that case I would tap Block and be no worse off, other than seeing the same notification again the next time, at which point I would probably figure out their trick.…

The real popup in Chrome and Firefox exceeds the website frame, so you can easily distinguish it.

I am convinced, by many real world observations, that the average joe user cannot distinguish fake html/css/js popups from OS popups.

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#247

Post by 0xcde4c3db »

jokoon wrote: post #105

I'm really curious how you can outlaw dark patterns.

Dark patterns aren't fundamentally new, they've just recently taken on a new form in software. An example of an old dark pattern was that a company would simply mail people unsolicited merchandise, and then bill them an inflated price for it if it wasn't returned. In that case, the (US) law was changed to specify that any such unsolicited shipment is presumed to be a gift and the sender is not entitled to payment for it.

The FTC has been dealing with this kind of crap for over a century. The key is that this is in the context of advertising and trade practices, not viewpoint or artistic style. You'll still be able to include fictional dark patterns in your post-cyberpunk visual novel if you want to.

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#248

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

thraway123412 wrote: post #235
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The moral of the story is that they were so big on a dark pattern, I'll be getting the subscription. > Yeah thanks for rewarding them for that. That was not a nice thing to do -altering a quote, to make it appear as if I said something I didn't. I am leaving your response in its unmodified entirety, above. Look, you have your opinion, I have mine, but It's a decent app. I will be providing feedback to them -as a p…

That was not intended to be read as a literal quote or an attempt to make it appear as if you said something you didn't. That's a fairly common way of picking a message apart to make a point, on some parts of the internet. Sometimes people paraphrase instead of literally copying words (esp. if there's no good short sequence of words to borrow), but quote marks are still used. I wish we had a better notation for this.…

Understood.

I believe that, as a software developer, I am constantly encountering the classic "Do $20,000 worth of work for me for free." If I refuse, it can sometimes get quite unpleasant.

As it so happens, I actually do a great deal of free software. The users can sometimes be a bit on the "knucklehead" side, but they usually respect my boundaries.

The people that don't, tend to be business owners. I sort of expect it, as a good business owner is always looking for every advantage they can. I can sometimes get rather peeved by their attitudes. Around these parts, business owners tend to be especially aggressive, and NY is known for a hyper-aggressive environment and culture.

The people that wrote the app do a valuable service. They trained up a fairly effective neural network. The apps are...OK. Not outstanding, but OK. They do get their primary function done pretty effectively. That took time and skill.

They want to be paid, and I don't begrudge them. I believe that supporting paid software is a moral imperative for me. I won't go about laying my values on other people, but I choose to have this attitude, and I like to follow it with action.

Re: Request for comments regarding topics to be discussed at Dark Patterns workshop

#250

Post by shkkmo »

jeremy_wiebe wrote: post #239
bogwog wrote: post #152

A common one is fake consent popups for system notifications. Websites need to ask for consent before sending system notifications via the Notifications API. If a user declines, that website is blocked from asking again (for obvious reasons) But many websites cheat this by showing a fake consent popup designed to mimic what the browser would show. If a user clicks "Decline" on the fake popup, the website won't show t…

This is commonly referred to as a “soft ask.” The reasons for it are not always nefarious. On some platforms you cannot provide any commentary on why you want to send push notifications and so the soft ask provides a way to give more context on the next (real) permission dialog. I’m not saying this isn’t abused all over, but when used effectively it can provide the user with more information to decide if they want to…

An informative prompt explaining why permissions are needed with a single continue button is not a dark pattern.

If you have a "decline" button that bypasses the browser, then you are using a dark pattern.

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