A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013) • Hacker News Board

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#91

Post by KhoomeiK » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:31 PM UTC

Zelphyr wrote: post #90

All I've heard for the past 12+ years is "engagement". The singular focus on that one word to the exclusion of everything else is astounding to me. As if it is some magic incantation on the part of BizDev (or whatever they're called these days) that instantly transmogrifies users into profits. At one company I worked at, we had a digital product that was part of a suite of services our company provided. It was useful…

> So I never could figure out why our marketing team was all about engagement other than they kept hearing that word said about other digital products and, so, naturally it applies to ours as well and we must do what everyone else is doing!

"Cargo cult marketing"?

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#92

Post by RGamma » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:32 PM UTC

aresant wrote: post #25

This presentation is wonderful for its PR value "people here care" but naïve bordering on malicious in its approach and understanding of Google's business. 11 years ago PG called the iPad the "hip flask" of the internet (1) and it's 10x worse today than it was then. The incentives of every major ad-supported tech platform are the same - maximize engagement to maximize profit. Every dollar of profit, every promotion,…

If iPad is the hip flask, the smartphone is the needle and TikTok the heroin.

I sometimes wish I had gone without the internet the past 10 years. Emotionally I can no longer quite feel it due to many small increments of change, but intellectually I know the culture shock would be massive today.

So much activity is generated and has converged on so few platforms, most of it passive consumption. Communication is quick and fleeting, the feeds reign. The search engines full of subtle forms of (blog)spam I'm increasingly having trouble identifying. No distinction between off- and online anymore. (There's always exceptions)

The knowledge of who does what when is centralized in black box institutions with massive conflict of interest to reveal anything about it, so nobody outside really knows what's going on. All we can see are the shadows on the wall.

Business is failing to self-align with (what I and apparently this Googler think are) civic/enlightenment values and societies were hit by this like a truck out of nowhere and they're still playing catch-up, trying to make sense of it.

And meanwhile so many brains will be rewired.. We haven't seen the end of whatever this is yet.

BTW check out this comment saying this specific presentation was a leak, not a PR move: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27764710 (doesn't preclude other posturing around this issue of course)

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#93

Post by ottomanbob » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:33 PM UTC

valw wrote: post #62

A shameless-because-related plug: https://www.reddit.com/r/patient_hackernews/ A Hacker News mirror biased in favor of thoughtful discussion, by enforcing that you cannot comment on something in less than 24 hours. This might help you spend less of your attention on Hacker News, by: 1. Showing you a subset of hot posts 2. Enforcing high response delays (thus suppressing the impulse to frantically refresh for new comm…

I've been dying for a tool like this. Just want to sort hacker news by week / months. So I could stop checking everyday. Will give feedback

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#94

Post by asteroidbelt » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:34 PM UTC

Zelphyr wrote: post #90

All I've heard for the past 12+ years is "engagement". The singular focus on that one word to the exclusion of everything else is astounding to me. As if it is some magic incantation on the part of BizDev (or whatever they're called these days) that instantly transmogrifies users into profits. At one company I worked at, we had a digital product that was part of a suite of services our company provided. It was useful…

> we didn't make any more money the longer someone spent on that product. There was no advertising model associated with it--it is a per-seat hosted solution.

Are you sure that time spent on product does not affect sales? E. g. is it possible that if people don't spend time with product, they will renew the subscription next year?

> So I never could figure out why our marketing team was all about engagement other than they kept hearing that word said about other digital products and, so, naturally it applies to ours as well and we must do what everyone else is doing!

Perhaps it is the issue of the marketing department of that organization is that their bonuses are not tied to any performance metrics.

In proper organizations (like Google) marketing director get paid if their marketing efforts give the company more revenue than the company spends on marketing, and fired otherwise.

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#95

Post by azinman2 » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:38 PM UTC

cratermoon wrote: post #89

azinman2 wrote: post #42

I don't see how calling out the demographics of the designers making the decisions has anything to do with the larger implications of societal impact. There are terrible things done by people of every demographic to millions of people, as well as great things. It's also less and less true (tho probably more so in 2013 when this was created), yet the problems still exist because the incentives are there (the real issu…

Why shouldn't that be part of the discussion? The actions of a few people with a certain common worldview having an impact on billions of peoples and the effects of that worldview ought to be examined, what's the objection to that? > the problems still exist because the incentives are there Yes, and who determines the incentives and provides the rewards?

It’s worthwhile to note the impact that few people have, but I don’t see how calling out demographics has any impact on YouTube video recommendations as a design pattern. Are we to believe a team of elderly Pacific Islander females wouldn’t make such choices, when the high level business goal is to retain people’s attention for as long as possible?

The incentives and rewards are provided by the market in the form of capital returns on clicks and viewership… globally across all demographics.

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#96

Post by Zelphyr » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:39 PM UTC

asteroidbelt wrote: post #94

Zelphyr wrote: post #90

All I've heard for the past 12+ years is "engagement". The singular focus on that one word to the exclusion of everything else is astounding to me. As if it is some magic incantation on the part of BizDev (or whatever they're called these days) that instantly transmogrifies users into profits. At one company I worked at, we had a digital product that was part of a suite of services our company provided. It was useful…

> we didn't make any more money the longer someone spent on that product. There was no advertising model associated with it--it is a per-seat hosted solution. Are you sure that time spent on product does not affect sales? E. g. is it possible that if people don't spend time with product, they will renew the subscription next year? > So I never could figure out why our marketing team was all about engagement other tha…

> Are you sure that time spent on product does not affect sales?

It may have, but not dramatically. The product wasn't what we were known for. Customers came to us for other services that we were known for (and, I should add, this company is very good at what they do) and this digital product sold as a sort-of upsell.

> Perhaps it is the issue of the marketing department of that organization is that their bonuses are not tied to any performance metrics.

I don't know for sure, not having any insight into that part of the business, but knowing that company I would bet you are right.

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#97

Post by crackercrews » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:44 PM UTC

valw wrote: post #62

A shameless-because-related plug: https://www.reddit.com/r/patient_hackernews/ A Hacker News mirror biased in favor of thoughtful discussion, by enforcing that you cannot comment on something in less than 24 hours. This might help you spend less of your attention on Hacker News, by: 1. Showing you a subset of hot posts 2. Enforcing high response delays (thus suppressing the impulse to frantically refresh for new comm…

Reddit won't even let me see either page without downloading the app. I'm used to the annoying prompts but have never been outright blocked before.

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#98

Post by charleshan » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:44 PM UTC

PDF version of the slides:

https://www.slideshare.net/paulsmarsden/google-deck-on-digit...

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#99

Post by scotty79 » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:46 PM UTC

Zelphyr wrote: post #90

All I've heard for the past 12+ years is "engagement". The singular focus on that one word to the exclusion of everything else is astounding to me. As if it is some magic incantation on the part of BizDev (or whatever they're called these days) that instantly transmogrifies users into profits. At one company I worked at, we had a digital product that was part of a suite of services our company provided. It was useful…

When you are in finances I think you hear "money" quite often.

Re: A call to minimize distraction and respect users’ attention (2013)

#100

Post by marcosdumay » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 8:50 PM UTC

asteroidbelt wrote: post #94

Zelphyr wrote: post #90

All I've heard for the past 12+ years is "engagement". The singular focus on that one word to the exclusion of everything else is astounding to me. As if it is some magic incantation on the part of BizDev (or whatever they're called these days) that instantly transmogrifies users into profits. At one company I worked at, we had a digital product that was part of a suite of services our company provided. It was useful…

> we didn't make any more money the longer someone spent on that product. There was no advertising model associated with it--it is a per-seat hosted solution. Are you sure that time spent on product does not affect sales? E. g. is it possible that if people don't spend time with product, they will renew the subscription next year? > So I never could figure out why our marketing team was all about engagement other tha…

> E. g. is it possible that if people don't spend time with product, they will renew the subscription next year?

For most tools (and the GP does make it seem to be the case), usage count is roughly correlated with added value, and time/usage to added cost.

So, are you asking if total time spent on it is correlated with added value? Well, maybe. You are just making a very bad question, and may get any random answer. If you are using this as a metric, all the easy ways to increase it add costs, not value.