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

minimizedistraction.com

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

#151

Post by yupper32 »

aiisjustanif wrote: post #63
tomaskafka wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. In a long term, company will never do anything against incentives their business model sets up. Google is the ad company. Don't work for ad conpany.

Tell that to the many SF tech workers optimizing for profit.

Not optimizing for profit is a very privileged position to be in.

Are people with poor backgrounds supposed to think that selling some ads is worse than having your family suffer? I can make a third as much and maybe do something better for society, but what happens then if the industry collapses?

I'm not coding killer drones. I'm working for an ad company.

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

#152

Post by zmix »

Isthatablackgsd wrote: post #22
zmix wrote: post #17

Very nice document, speaks from my heart. But the document's format sucks! I do not even get an address in the addressbar in Vivaldi. I would love to download this as PDF or in any other presentation format, but it seems to be impossible, without going through the code.

Go back to the website and append in the address bar "/img/" without the quote marks on the end and boom you get a full list of slide. Enjoy. Very easy to find since it only took 5 sec to load up the console and bam it is right there.

Yeah, that's what I said: You have to open up the dev-console. Which sucks for a document download.

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

#153

Post by savingsPossible »

AlbertCory wrote: post #76
iseethroughbs wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to be right. But to be right is not the same as being useful.

"Easy to be right"?? Good to know. But why isn't everyone doing it, then? Maybe you have a useful idea on regulating attention-sucking? Please share.

He/she probably meant "its easier to point a real problem than to find a real, stable solution"

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

#154

Post by ssivark »

david_allison wrote: post #53
ssivark wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it broke the back button! There seems to be no way to go back a slide if you forwarded by tapping accidentally!!!

The left arrow key does this

On mobile. (Firefox on iOS, in case it matters)

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

#155

Post by ryandrake »

BoxOfRain wrote: post #132
acituan wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would guess the number of people who have opted-out of the notifications are either not reported, or the aggregate opt-out ratio doesn't make a ding on overall notification conversion rates. In other words, people don't have a uniform frustration tolerance to irrelevant push notifications, and losing the most irritable segment might be 'worth' it if the majority of the population is still getting them. An alternati…

Yeah, I know this is an anecdote but most people in my life just put up with a constant stream of buzzing and pinging. I’m very much in the habit of not allowing any notifications to begin with, especially in my browser, but I’m in a minority I think. Emails are even worse, I unsubscribe from the vast majority and block the ones I can’t (Hermes are utterly revolting for this noise generation, three non-unsubscribable…

I remember sitting at a restaurant some time pre-covid, and watching this young couple a few tables over with their phones on the table. Every 1-2 seconds or so, something dinged or buzzed, or the screen lit up. It was like Las Vegas on their phone. Beep beep beep ding ding flash. And like Pavlov's dogs, every time the phones lit up, they interrupted whatever they were doing (talking, eating, whatever), picked up their phones and started playing around with them. I would be an insane basket case after 30 minutes of this, but they somehow managed to get through an entire meal with essentially a casino light and sound show erupting on their phones. How do people's brains manage this without melting down?

For me? Mute + Do Not Disturb mode 24/7. No notifications, no texts, no phone calls, no sounds, period. I use my phone on my own terms, not when some app summons me. I can't imagine my brain surviving any other way.

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

#156

Post by dredmorbius »

crackercrews wrote: post #97
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.

https://i.reddit.com/r/patient_hackernews/

https://old.reddit.com/r/patient_hackernews/

https://teddit.net/r/patient_hackernews/

I'm not endorsing Reddit's increasingly user-hostile, disrespectful, and contemptuous UI/UX.

I am pointing out that there are altnernatives, both by Reddit and others.

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

#157

Post by dredmorbius »

In the 8 years that have elapsed since this pitch was made at Google, one conclusion is absolutely crystal clear: the industry has as little self-regulatory control over its use of such dark patterns as the public has over avoiding them.

Regulation, taxation, and where necessary, criminalisation, are obvious and necessary.

I'll note that for once, the patterns are not entirely synonymous with massive tech monopolies, though it is the monopolists who have the greatest resources and capability to tune their attention-diverting practices to the absolute maximum degree.

The naivete Tristan reveals here is rather charming, however.

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

#158

Post by suyash »

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…

At my previous company the magic word was "consumption" and goal for everyone seem to be drive consumption of our services at any cost. Now you can understand what that would lead to. User preferences and best interest is generally last thing on everyone's mind.

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

#159

Post by codeproject »

The presentation itself is a huge distraction. I understand the good intention behind it. but does it really neccessary to use 137 pages to illustrate a very simple issue? I think 5 pages is more than enough to explain it clearly. I read this minimize distraction slides have been viewed half millions time already, if the maker use the slides carefully, wouldn't it save a millions of hours user's time. And life?

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

#160

Post by greyface- »

caturopath wrote: post #137
dorkwood wrote: post #118

I received a notification from Uber on the weekend. It said something to the effect of "it's a nice day today, why don't you take a ride?" I've never told my phone to fuck off faster. How many people out there were in the middle of an important task, only to have their phone ask them if they wanted to take a car somewhere for no reason? The collective man-hours of distraction being generated must be staggering; years…

It's galling that using notifications for ads is allowed by the marketplaces.

https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#4.5...

  4.5.4 Push Notifications must not be required for the app to function, and
  should not be used to send sensitive personal or confidential information.
  Push Notifications should not be used for promotions or direct marketing
  purposes unless customers have explicitly opted in to receive them via consent
  language displayed in your app’s UI, and you provide a method in your app for
  a user to opt out from receiving such messages. Abuse of these services may
  result in revocation of your privileges.
In practice it's not enforced, though.
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